Nova Scotia signs memorandum of understanding with 10 universities

Nova Scotia's Department of Labour and Advanced Education signed a four-year memorandum of understanding with the province's 10 universities Wednesday pledging to improve things like sexual violence prevention and disability services.

The memorandum also contains guidelines around executive compensation, and says universities commit to outlining a process to review fees and other costs faced by students for things such as accommodation and meal plans.

The agreement is retroactive to April 1, 2015, and will run until March 31, 2019.

Memorandum criticized

The Canadian Federation of Students in Nova Scotia released a statement criticizing the memorandum.

The federation said the memorandum caps provincial funding increases to one per cent a year until 2019, putting the cost of post-secondary education onto students.

It said the tuition policy laid out in the memorandum reaffirms the ability of universities to make a one-time increase in tuition fees above the three per cent cap through "market adjustments" and removes the cap for out-of-province, graduate and professional students.

'Surprising and disappointing'

"It is surprising and disappointing to see the government is not listening to students' voices on this issue," said Charlotte Kiddell, chair of the federation in Nova Scotia. 

The federation said it is "encouraging" to see the province agrees that more needs to be done to combat sexualized violence, but the memorandum doesn't go far enough.

It leaves it to individual universities to come up with plans to improve sexual violence prevention and disability services. The federation said students have no recourse if their school doesn't get around to making such policies.

Kiddell said sexual violence needs to be addressed in binding legislation.

CBC News contacted the Department of Labour and Advanced Education and is waiting for a response.