Undergraduate students in Saskatchewan and Alberta are taking the brunt of average tuition fee increases in our universities. In this province, while graduate students slide by with no increase, undergrads are getting hit with a 5.7 per cent hike. In Alberta, graduate students are seeing an increase of less than a percent while the undergrads get socked with a hike of 7.1 per cent. Nationally, the increases were 1.8 per cent for undergrads and 1.6 per cent for grads.

Statistics Canada says the increase in Saskatchewan for undergrads was primarily attributable to the addition of a new tuition fee for veterinary medicine. In Alberta, it was the result of a change in policy, enabling institutions to raise tuition by up to seven per cent.

Of the four categories of: Social and behavioural sciences and legal studies, business management and public administration, physical and life science and technologies, and humanities, the average undergrad tuition in Saskatchewan was higher than the Canadian average in all cases.

For international undergrads, tuition fee increases were found in nine provinces, ranging from
0.1 per cent in our province to a whopping 25 per cent in Alberta.

For international grad students, tuition feeds in Saskatchewan were unchanged whereas in Alberta, students were met with a 30 per cent hike.