THE ECONOMIC FACTORS OF UNIVERSITY ACCESSIBILITY
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The Economic factors of University Accessibility
Is university becoming less accessible to students in Canada?
AP Seminar
2018
Word Count: 1118
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The question: What economic factors affect university accessibility? Accessibility being
admissions/acceptance and participation, has been studied and reviewed in many articles. Studies
from all over Canada and other countries have been conducted to differentiate economic factors
between the cost and accessibility of a university degree. Does every teen in Canada have an
equal chance to receive financial aid? Economically speaking, financial aid and other forms of
financial support is dependant on parental income. However, not every parent is willing to help
with the cost of a secondary education so, is it fair that the availability of financial aid is based
off parental income? With that being said, a disturbing trend shows lower class families are
increasingly likely to attend community colleges, and less selective four-year colleges than
middle class families (Lange, 2001). University has become extremely important for many
reasons, yet studies have shown some schools have had a decrease in applicants due to higher
tuition and fees. A study summarized by David Johnson and Fiona Rahman who are research
students from MABE, took data from the Canadian Labour Force Survey and discovered that
higher tuition levels in the 1990s did in fact reduce the probability of university participation of
persons aged 17-19 (Johnson, 2005). Furthermore, university applications are getting more and
more competitive; which minimizes the possibility of acceptance and scholarship opportunity.
Our main question is, are students restricted to post secondary options due to economic factors?
Factors of family income
The annual household income varies from family to family, no two families are the same
economically. To add, different families require different forms of support. For example, certain
families do not produce an income great enough to send their child to university. The tuition of
THE ECONOMIC FACTORS OF UNIVERSITY ACCESSIBILITY
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university is constantly rising and is unattainable for a lot of students. In fact, studies have shown
some schools have a decrease in applicants due to higher higher tuition and fees. Although many
universities offer financial aid and other forms economic support to the families, not all of the
students are receiving the support they truly need. To add, some families may have a high
income but offer no financial support to their child. Parental income should have nothing to do
with the availability of financial support from universities. Equally as important, family and
personal characteristics are not being taken into account during university acceptance. The
respondents focus on other information about the individuals, such as; age, gender, family type,
highest education stat...
