Please be sure to mention in any ad copy that CNC got rid of their clinical counsellors so they could add more administrators. With 1-in-5 students in post-secondary schools suffering from some form of mental illness, this really matters to parents whose children are furthering their education. CNC is now one of only two community colleges in the province who do not see fit to have a competent counselling staff. Prospective education consumers see this and look elsewhere, which is too bad considering what else CNC and PG have to offer.

When we talk about PG as a place for students to “continue their studies”, does that mean that the target is post-secondary students?

Prince George has JOBS available maybe they should let the unemployed in Prince George know where.

I agree with bitter. It would be interesting to know what and where these jobs are.

Furthermore., We need to deal with the declining enrolment is our schools, CNC, and UNBC. There seems to be a drop in enrolment every year despite CNC and UNBC’s efforts to increase enrolment.

So, lets look a the root cause of the problem.

1. Many people who retire leave Prince George and retire elsewhere.

2. People who come to Prince George are usually employee’s that come to replace someone who has retired, so the net effect on population growth is nil.

3. We have a large influx of people moving to Prince George, from outlying areas, especially West of Prince George, these people for the most part are renters, that rent the houses, apartments, etc that become available because of people leaving the City.

4. We have a large number of seniors that pass on each year. This number is replaced by the number of people being born, however, those who are newborns, do not actually make a real contribution to the City for at least 20 years.

5. If we were to do an in depth analysis of what actually happens in Prince George in regards to deaths, births, retirement, leaving the City and coming to the City we would get a much better understanding of what needs to take place to solve these problems.

6. As an example when UNBC gets the number one spot for small universities in Canada, we jump up and down and preen, and make it look like we actually did something to earn this recognition. In fact a lot of the points that are given, are in fact **negative** for Prince George. One example would be the teacher to student ratio. While we get points for this from Macleans magazine, the real reason we have a low ratio, is because we have very few students attending UNBC.

7. There is a huge difference between extolling the virtues of Prince George, and scratching below the surface to see the grit and rust.

8. With the huge number of seniors on limited income, being faced with increases in everything from Hydro, to car Insurance, to house Insurance, medical, gas, taxes, and services, etc; we are basically driving people from the City.

Its time to take off the rose colored glasses and see this town for what it actually is, and then roll up our sleeves and see what we can do about it.

Palopu, the bulk of your post talks about retirees and seniors and I don’t think these are the people that they are speaking about when they are talking about making PG “an education destination”.

I read it to mean that they are looking to attract 18-25 year olds to PG in order to begin and/or complete their studies. They are not necessarily looking for permanent residents, nor are they looking to solve other issues facing the community. It sounds to me like they simply want to attract more outsiders to PG’s post secondary institutions. Given the population growth estimates for PG and the north in general, this is probably a good path to go down.

So the question then becomes, what would attract students to PG? On the education front, I would think that low tuition and access to learning opportunities that may not be available elsewhere would be a good start. This could be the classroom approach, class size, specific programs, campus lifestyle, etc. They have to build something unique, attractive and competitive.

The city also needs to be attractive for that demographic. What do 18-25 year olds want? They want a city with a social scene, places to go, things to do, activities to partake in, etc. They probably want a city that promotes health and wellness, diversity, is vibrant, etc. It would also help if there were employment opportunities for students while they attend school or in the summer months if they chose to hang around during the summer break.

Does PG fit this profile? If it doesn’t, could it? If it could, would you want it to?