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| Annsley Kesten |
Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) will cap the intake of international study permit applications at approximately 360,000 approvals for the year 2024, a decrease of 35 per cent from 2023 figures. The cap is distributed amongst the individual provinces and territories and is weighted by population. Students pursuing master’s and doctoral degrees, as well as elementary and secondary education, are not included in the cap. Study permit renewals and current study permit holders will not be impacted by the new cap system.
The government further indicated that in the coming weeks, spouses of international students will no longer be eligible for an open work permit unless the principal applicant is enrolled in master’s or doctoral studies. An effective date for this policy change was not provided.
Effective Jan. 23, all study permit applications submitted to IRCC must include an attestation letter from the province or territory of study. There is currently no publicized process for applicants to request the issuance of a study permit attestation letter, however provincial and territorial governments are required to establish such a process by March 31, 2024. The result is that the processing of study permit applications is effectively on hold until this mechanism is in place.
In addition, the government announced changes to the eligibility criteria under the Post-Graduation Work Permit Program as follows:
- Effective Sept. 1, 2024, international students who begin a study program that is part of a curriculum licensing arrangement (public college-private partnerships) are no longer eligible for a post-graduation work permit upon graduation from studies.
- Eligibility for a post-graduation work permit will be expanded for graduates of master’s and other short graduate-level programs. These students will be eligible to apply for a three-year work permit following completion of their program. Currently, the duration of a post-graduation work permit is solely based on the length of the completed study program, which often results in shorter work permit durations for those completing graduate-level programs.
The government states that these measures were introduced to target institutional “bad actors” that have led to rapid increases in the number of international students arriving in Canada in recent years, stating that these increases have put pressure on housing, health care and other public services. Immigration Minister Marc Miller noted that the driving force behind these changes is the actions of certain institutions aiming to boost revenue by substantially expanding the intake of international students without offering adequate support to these students.
The federal government has stated that the post-secondary public-private partnership model is a large factor in the rapid increase in the number of international students in Canada. Under these arrangements, students attend a private college that has been licensed to deliver the curriculum of an associated public college. These programs have less oversight than public colleges. An internal IRCC report prepared in 2021 stated that in some instances, up to 90 per cent of students did not attend classes at some of these private colleges.
This report indicates that IRCC was aware of this issue through its own international study permit compliance regime, and could have taken more targeted steps to address patterns of non-compliance at those specific institutions much sooner. If the federal government had imposed consequences on noncompliant institutions earlier, the need to limit the number of foreign students nationally through an annual student cap may have been avoided.
Annsley Kesten is a senior associate at BARTLAW LLP, Canadian immigration, barristers and solicitors.
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