Category: Focus Friday

Hi everyone,

Tiffany here.

A quick reminder that there is a Focus Friday session today (October 24) from 12:30-1:30pm Eastern on International Student Enrolment.

I’ll be joined by Victor Tomiczek (Director of International Recruitment and Global Partnerships at Cape Breton University) and Eric Simard (Director of Fanshawe International and former Director of International Recruitment and Market Development at Fanshawe College). We’ll be discussing past, current, and expected future trends in international student recruitment, enrolment, and engagement.

If you haven’t registered yet, it’s not too late. Register here.

Looking Back

Two weeks ago, we gathered for a conversation that hit close to home: What does the student experience look and feel like today?

I was joined by three people who live and breathe these questions every day: Wasiimah Joomun (Canadian Alliance of Student Associations, a federal student advocacy organization for college, university and polytechnic students), Brendan Roberts (Students Nova Scotia), a provincial level student advocacy organization for university and college students), and Olamipo Ogunnote (Ontario Student Voices, a provincial advocacy organization for college students). Together, they painted a vivid picture of how students are navigating post-secondary life in 2025. What we heard was both sobering and hopeful.

Wasiimah reminded us that the purpose of post-secondary has shifted. Students aren’t coming to explore anymore; they’re coming to survive. “We’ve turned education from a space of discovery into a checklist for employability,” she said. Costs are rising, pressures are mounting, and the system is asking students to thrive in conditions it wasn’t built to support. “Students are no longer exploring their interests; they’re trying to match what the labour market needs” she said.

Brendan spoke about the ripple effects of affordability on mental health and belonging. From housing, food, transportation, all of it weighs heavily. “You can’t build a community for someone,” he said, “but you can give them the tools to foster it themselves.” Students need the chance, and support, to create their own networks, not just attend the ones we design for them.

Olami brought the conversation to Ontario’s college sector, where students are juggling work, caregiving, and coursework, often all in the same day. He shared the story of one student finishing an eight-hour shift, racing home to her kids, and starting her assignment at midnight. “Resilience,” Olami said, “shouldn’t be about surviving hardship. It should be about thriving with opportunity.” Olami added to the piece on community with a great comment that has stuck with me since our conversation, “real community doesn’t come from infographics, it comes from matching the reality of students’ lives.”

Across all three perspectives, the thread was clear: affordability touches everything. Forty percent of students skip meals. One in four struggle to pay rent. One in five use food banks. Four percent have experienced homelessness. Students are still choosing education, but they’re not sure if their institutions and their governments through investment are choosing them back.

And yet, there’s optimism. Students still believe in the value of learning. They want to help shape institutions that see them not only as learners, but as people with families, jobs, and ambitions that stretch far beyond the classroom.

You can catch the full conversation here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywcHrBEwA-M.

Looking Ahead

On the next Focus Friday, we will be covering the hottest topic of that week: the Federal Budget. What happens, what it means, and what the early reactions to it are. That conversation happens on November 7th, and registration is already open (see below, in a big green box).

In the meantime, keep sharing your ideas in the registration form or reach out anytime at [email protected].

I’m looking forward to seeing many of you this afternoon, and again in two weeks.

Cheers,

Tiff

Hi everyone,

Tiffany here.

A quick reminder that there is a Focus Friday session today (October 10) from 12:30–1:30pm Eastern on the Student Experience.

I’ll be joined by Wasiimah Joomun (Executive Director, Canadian Alliance of Student Associations), Brendan Roberts (Executive Director, Students Nova Scotia), and Olamipo Ogunnote (Director of Advocacy and Strategic Partnerships, Ontario Student Voices) for a conversation on student experience—from campus culture and communication to what feels most different about being a student today.

If you haven’t registered yet, it’s not too late. Register here.

The format is simple: we’ll start with a few questions to our invited guests, then open the floor for a coffee-chat style discussion. Bring your ideas, hang out, and learn something new.

Looking Back

Two weeks ago, we launched our first Focus Friday with a big question: What will Canada’s post-secondary system need to look like to thrive by 2035?

I was joined by Jackie Pichette from RBC Thought Leadership and Sunny Chan from the Business + Higher Education Roundtable (BHER), two people who’ve spent the past few months travelling the country with us, listening to hundreds of ideas about the future of higher ed. Together, we tried to pull those threads into a single conversation about where we go next.

A few themes stood out:

Both Jackie and Sunny agreed that Canada’s post-secondary system has to get much more comfortable with change. As Sunny put it, we’re still “a little scared of big changes.” From funding models to internal governance, we need more room, and more courage, to experiment. Jackie imagined a future where the morning news is full of stories about new programs and partnerships instead of program cuts. “I hope ten years from now I hear stories about innovation, not layoffs,” she said.

That optimism came with some realism, too. Jackie talked about how Canada’s national priorities such as defence, AI, and energy, depend on colleges and universities producing the talent to match. Right now, she said, the gap between what’s needed and what’s being trained is wider than it should be.

Sunny offered the employer perspective. Work-integrated learning has gone from a nice-to-have to an expectation, but the challenge now is building lasting partnerships instead of one-off placements. “The most successful collaborations,” she said, “aren’t projects with an end date—they’re embedded relationships.”

Another topic that kept coming up was AI. Jackie argued that AI literacy should be treated like critical thinking—something every student gains, regardless of discipline. Some institutions, like Ohio State University, have already made AI fluency mandatory for all students. Canadian institutions can’t afford to wait too long to follow suit.

Of course, none of this happens without money and trust. Jackie pointed out that institutions need both more flexible funding and stronger financial aid if they’re going to modernize responsibly. And both speakers reflected on the erosion of public confidence in higher education. Sunny framed it simply: “If institutions can better tell their impact stories, it makes it easier for employers to champion them.”

Looking ahead to 2035, both ended on a hopeful note. Jackie hopes that by then, lifelong learning will finally be the default where people can stack, pivot, and return to education without starting from scratch. Sunny envisions institutions that serve whole communities, not just students aged 18 to 22, acting as anchors of both economic and civic life.

Want to listen or watch this discussion? You can find it on YouTube.

Looking Ahead

We’ll be turning next to enrolment. How it’s changing, what’s staying the same, and what institutions are learning along the way. That conversation happens on October 24, and registration is already open (see below, in a big green box).

In the meantime, keep sharing your ideas in the registration form or reach out anytime at [email protected].

I’m looking forward to seeing many of you this afternoon, and again in two weeks.

Cheers,

Tiff