Last Friday, McGill Principal Heather Munroe-Blum called for Quebec to increase its enrollment of international students in a speech hosted by the Montreal Council on Foreign Relations. Munroe-Blum drew attention to a topic that has been the subject of much debate in recent years—the place of international students in Canada and Canadian universities.

“International students are exactly what Quebec needs,” Munroe-Blum said. “They spend years in our institutions, they speak or are motivated to learn French, they know and embrace Quebec’s values, and they are already integrating into our society.”

A study by Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada estimated that international students spent over $7.7 billion dollars in Canada in 2010, and created over 81,000 jobs that same year. According to Maclean’s magazine, the two provinces most successful in recruiting international students are Ontario and British Columbia.

Although Quebec was ranked third in this study, Munroe-Blum mentioned that the province’s international student population decreased by eight per cent between 2001 and 2010.

“We face an international race for talent and Quebeckers are not winning,” she said. “We can only win with incentives for universities to attract, support, and retain top talent with quality and accessibility.”

In recent years, other provincial governments have aimed to attract more international students to their universities. In 2010, Ontario’s new Trillium Scholarship program created 75 scholarships for international graduate students studying in Ontario, while Ontario’s residency rules were modified to encourage these students to stay in the province after the completion of their degrees.

Marc Weinstein, McGill’s Vice-Principal (Development and Alumni Relations), told the Tribune that the McGill Alumni Association does not have any specific programs in place to encourage alumni to stay in Quebec after graduation.

“However, we do offer a range of career service programs that … are aimed at matching graduating McGill students with McGill alumni who have employment opportunities they are looking to fill,” he said. “This no doubt contributes to an increase in graduates choosing to launch their careers [in Quebec].”

In her speech, Munroe-Blum pointed to tuition as a frequently debated issue involving international students.

“Some would argue that low tuition will attract talent, but … low tuition does not lead to quality, and quality is precisely what students are looking for,” she said.

According to the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS), international students have faced steep tuition increases since 1976, and in 2009, CFS argued against continually rising international tuition fees.

“High differential fees are an unfair burden and a barrier to post-secondary education for international students,” CFS wrote. “Ultimately, such fees could threaten Canada’s ability to attract and retain foreign scholars.”

Memorial University in Newfoundland offers some of the lowest tuition rates in Canada—approximately $2,550 per year for Canadian undergraduate students, and $8,800 for international. However, only 7.9 per cent of the 17,944 students enrolled at Memorial in the fall of 2011 were international students, according to their website

In comparison, McGill’s student body is composed of roughly 25 per cent international students, each of whom pay over $14,000 in tuition per year. Despite McGill’s success in attracting international students, Munroe-Blum emphasized that very little of this additional money goes to the university.

“Under the current Quebec funding system, most of the tuition paid by students from outside Quebec returns to the government,” Munroe-Blum said. “With a few exceptions, McGill keeps only a small portion of the fees these students pay to support these students in their studies.”

In B.C., the system of incorporating international students into universities works very differently. According to Tim Rahilly, associate vice-president of students at Simon Fraser University (SFU), B.C. universities charge all Canadian students the same tuition. The institutions then set their own international student fees and—unlike McGill—none of this money is given to the province.

“The [international] fee usually is slightly more than the equivalent of what the institution gets for domestic students—a per head fee from the province, [plus] student … tuition [fees],” Rahilly told the Tribune. “The province does not fund any international student spaces.”

Rahilly added that B.C. universities who increase their international enrollment therefore benefit both from the differential student fees and from the diversification of their student body.

Munroe-Blum also discussed  the importance of the diversity brought by international students to McGill and Canada. She said that although Quebec currently falls short in attracting international students, there is time for the province to reprioritize the issue.

“Quebec is … positioned to win the race for global talent if we move quickly, competitively, and with confidence,” she said. “Quebec needs … a clear strategy for making Quebec a global education and research destination, or we will fall even further behind.”

—Additional reporting by Bea Britneff.