A grade 12 diploma is free – if you do it while you are supposed to. Drop out, party, have a baby, slack off etc and miss the boat well… Why do we have to pay for you to make it up later?
The world is a tough place.

Or is that a stereotype – what’s the demographic of the students taking this course now?

The demographic is diverse, ranging from those who have been out of the high school system for little more than a year to those in their 40’s who have been displaced from their traditional lines of work and need to upgrade before entering post-secondary. In the first case, these are young people who most likely have finished their dogwood (high school diploma) but may be missing courses they require to get into their post-secondary program of choice. For example, they might want to get into nursing and lack the math and sciences they need. Or they may want to get into a foundation electrical trade program and need academic math and physics, which are required.
The vast majority of students graduate high school with little idea of a career path and as a result, don’t come out with the courses they need in math and the sciences to enter those careers. It is an incredibly good return on the dollar for taxpayers to assist these folks by further subsidies to the initial stage of their education when you consider the tax dollars funneled back into the system when these people reach their career goals and are working in their fields. The statistics are unequivocal about the boost to earnings from post-secondary education.
This is simply a good investment in human capital in our province, something the Liberals don’t seem to grasp.

Interceptor, there is nothing free about going to school now. Your kids cone home with a list of supplies ( used to be paid for ) then on top of a fee for this, money to participate in that etc. It’s a lot more than just paying school taxes these days.

I think education is a good thing and it should be looked at on an individual basis who gets it paid for.

Krusty, you have made a lot of good points.

Interceptor, sometimes kids will go wayward. Sometimes the kids take on the role of being the responsible one, and give up their own education to look after the siblings. Than go do their education later. Like you said, the world is a tough place. We really don’t know all the reasons why things happen, and it is quite humbling.

I don’t think it should be free, However, it has to be so that it is affordable to get your dogwood in adult education. A delicate balance between the facilities finance and social responsibility. I think adults that are wanting to complete their dogwood should be recognized and be assisted, these are the people that brings life skills and want to improve themselves, and will likely be great contributors to our society for years to come.

I agree with many of the points made by Krusty and He spoke.

The current policy only provides for free tuition. There are many other financial factors that face students when returning to school. Books, supplies and added student fees are the obvious. For some, it may involve day care, additional transportation & housing costs. Big difference when trying to live on your own at 22 than living with your parents at 17. And probably considerably more motivation.

My view is that Dogwood education courses should be tuition free period. If the student has enough fortitude to get their life together in order to go back to school, the least society can do is support their effort with tuition free education. Institutional policy can take care of restricting repeated failures and no shows.

What does society have to gain? Contributors and taxpayers to share the ongoing load. More tax contributions for my pension and health care in my old age. Works for me.

Some good points here guys, thanks.
P val – no kidding, I’ve got a couple in highschool right now. I guess I should have used air quotes. “Free” ;-)

And let’s not forget, that this education is free to all those who are in prison – seems hardly fitting to tell a person whose trying to improve their life that they have to pay, what someone who has committed a crime, is getting for free. This is an exceptionally short sighted policy change and makes me wonder what the government’s thinking is in all of this. The only thing that makes sense is those who can’t afford it, are probably already funded by welfare, or EI, and they want those who can afford to pay, to pay.

Lol interceptor.. Yes we pay so much now thanks to all the cuts to education from those lovely family first liberals.

From above by anotherside:
“What does society have to gain? Contributors and taxpayers to share the ongoing load. More tax contributions for my pension and health care in my old age. Works for me.”

Exactly. Society stands to gain plenty in the long run, why are so many people short sighted?

mnetalman.

I teach in this program, and the other thing to keep in mind is that many of our students do already have a high school diploma. However, lots of people work for a few years after high school to save money for tuition–while they are working, their courses expire and can’t be used as prerequisites anymore.

For example, let’s say you want to be a nurse. You take the prerequisites like Math 12, Biology 12, and Chemistry 12 in high school. You graduate, then work for a few years to save money before you apply for your nursing program (after all, you’ll have to pay tuition for that). Then you discover your Math 12 credit is only good for two years after you take it. You will have to re-take Math 12 to be able to even enter that nursing program.

Or perhaps you were a millworker who had a high school diploma. You graduated from high school, got a job at the mill, and worked there for 15 years–until the mill closed. Now you want to go back to school to change careers. Unfortunately, you took Communications 12 instead of English 12. It was perfectly acceptable for getting your high school diploma, but now you find out you can’t get into the program you want without English 12. You have to go back and take that course.

The comment above about the sheer diversity of people who take upgrading courses was bang on. Our students fit many different profiles, and all of them will find it much harder to access education if there is tuition attached to upgrading.

He adds given Victoria’s new Skills for Jobs Blueprint, “putting up more barriers for students trying to get into skills training makes no sense.”
How true.

It does make sense from a social engineering point of view. If the Liberals want students to go into lower academic, trades-type of programs because this is what their industry masters want, then restricting access to academic upgrading is a sure-fire way to achieve this. This way, British Columbians will always be hewers of wood and carriers of water. Unless they come from the moneyed class, in which case it’s business as usual.

Krusty … I know where you are coming from. Traditionally Trades was for lower level academics but current Trades training also requires decent academics skills; beyond the minimum mathematics and sciences required to get out of high school. I am no expert but I am aware that Electrical, for example, utilizes both Algebra and Physics. Carpentry uses Geometry. Millwright and the Pipe Trades get into pretty good Math applications. Machinists too.

Some might suggest that Welding doesn’t require much but I have met some pretty savvy and bright welders running their own businesses and bringing home much higher salaries that many university grads. Their knowledge of metallurgy is much more sophisticated than the survival welding that occurred in the bush years ago.

The only place now for high school dropouts is displacing the Temporary Foreign Workers in places like the fast food service industry. Maybe that is where the government is trying to direct these folks. (sarcasm intended)