Creative arts programs are being suspended across Ontario after November 2024 due to the federal government’s reduction of study permits for international students.
International students are a major source of revenue, creating financial challenges for Ontario colleges.
Sheridan College suspended six creative arts programs in November 2024, while Centennial College suspended 14 for the 2025 and 2026 academic years. Mohawk College suspended four for 2025, and St. Lawrence College suspended five for the start of Spring 2025.
Guillermo Acosta, the senior dean of the Faculty of Media, Creative Arts and Design at Humber Polytechnic, said they have a portfolio of programs in the Faculty of Media, Creative Arts and Design that has a strong component of STEAM, which incorporates the arts into STEM. They have user experience programs and arts-dedicated programs.
Acosta said programs have to become much more collaborative environments. Many of their professors are working together to make this framework perform well.
“For example, we had the technology students working with the journalists and they developed augmented reality. You could see the law signs with your phone and you point that particular candidate and then you can see what the platform that candidate was,” he said.
“ There hasn't been any increase in tuition. You see actually reduce the tuition 10 per cent. So we're operating with the same budget that we were operating eight years ago, by less than 10 per cent. What has happened with inflation all these years? The system is underfunded, which puts the system (under) stress,” he said.
Humber didn't have a huge increase in international students. They were cautious with the number of international students, and they are still impacted by the drop in international students, but not to the extent of the other colleges.
Mike Wise, a Journalism professor and program coordinator for the Journalism graduate certificate at Humber Polytechnic said he started teaching part-time in the program in 2016. Before that, it was a one-year program. However, for many years, the graduate certificate program was a two-year journalism program. In 2016, Humber shortened the program to a one-year program.
Wise found out in April that the journalism graduate certificate program was suspended due to the reduction in international students.
“You never know how the college makes these determinations, but it was a large issue across the sector, and they had concerns with that,” he said.
Humber told Wise to revise the graduate certificate program and “make it more appealing to domestic students.”
Wise said the polytechnic is bringing the program back as a pilot project for Humber with a new style of education called competency-based education. This style of education is used in medical schools and health programs but is not used that much in humanities.
Wise said he couldn’t find examples of this style of education in journalism programs in North America.
“What I have done is I've identified 54 key skills, hard journalism skills, that a journalist needs to graduate,” he said. “There's a lot of flexibility that is built into it. If you want to put a podcast series together or TV series, newscasts, you can go into that and demonstrate your competencies on these things."
The journalism graduate certificate program launches in September of 2025. Wise said that there are already people applying to the graduate certificate program.
Doyinsola Ajayi, an international student in the Broadcast Television and Videography program at Humber Polytechnic, says the value of creative arts in colleges is not seen by those who focus on science, technology, engineering and math. Humber ETC/Ryan Persaud
Doyinsola Ajayi, a Humber international student in the Broadcast Television and Videography program, said people don't see the value of the arts, they only see the value of medicine, science or finance.
Ajayi explained that the creative arts have long-term benefits that are connected to mental health and emotions, but people often overlook these benefits because these benefits isn't easy for people to see the value of it in the creative arts. She said the creative arts encourage inclusivity and cultural differences, “ bringing together of people.”
She said talent isn't law or medicine, but talent is art, music and film.
“You cannot, absolutely cannot bury that talent. That talent needs to be shown to the world,” she said.
Ajayi thinks Humber students and professors need to do a better job of making creative arts students feel valued and “know that they're doing something important.”
Paul Cross, the coordinator of the Radio Programs at Humber Polytechnic, said if there are changes to the creative arts industry, Humber would need to say it needs to make sure program curriculums reflect those changes.
Cross said programs have advisory committees that have experts from the industry and outside of the industry “ who can say, 'are you folks teaching about this or have you thought about that for the future?'”
He said radio faculty have talked about podcasting for some time, a burgeoning field within broadcasting.
“You could say that in the Toronto area, which is where we are, there's actually a podcast industry that can hire people other than a podcast cottage industry out of people's homes and basements,” he said.
Acosta said employers want students with interdisciplinary skills and they ensure the creative arts programs incorporate diverse learning STEAM opportunities.
