Feed the Students, Starve the Schools?
Yesterday, I outlined the 2013-14 budget picture for university and college operating transfer funds. Today, I’m doing something similar for student assistance. It’s a very different picture.
In addition to the caveats I mentioned yesterday regarding the challenges of budget-to-budget comparisons, student aid analysis poses its own unique set of challenges. The main one is that provinces have trouble accurately predicting demand; so if in one year demand soars (or falls), the next year tends to bring a big budget increase (or decrease) to bring numbers into line with reality. Also, at least theoretically, student aid is counter-cyclical. As student incomes rise, need goes down, and so too do aid expenditures. So a declining budget doesn’t necessarily mean a government is cutting – it may also mean that students are better off (or that a government budgeted high the previous year, and is bringing estimates down to match reality). In short, some care is required in interpretation.
Alex Usher | HESA:
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