MRU receives 456 new seats for high-demand programs over three-year period
by Riggs Zyrille Vergara, Publishing Editor
Through an effort made by the government of Alberta called the Alberta at Work initiative as part of the 2022 budget, MRU gets to receive funding of almost $7.9 million to add 456 new seats to their high-demand programs over the course of three years.
These programs include Computer Science with 120 new seats, Computer Information Systems with 90 new seats and the Business Administration with 246 new seats.
This is part of one of the specific programs of the Alberta at Work initiative called the Targeted Enrolment Expansion, where the provincial government had invested $171 million over three years to create almost 10,000 additional new seats for the province’s post-secondary institutions.
“Over the past few weeks, I’ve had the honour of travelling around our province to deliver exciting news that benefits students, employers, post-secondary institutions and communities in every region. This is the largest targeted enrolment expansion in Alberta’s history. I want to thank all of the institutions who submitted proposals and for working with us to help secure Alberta’s future,” Minister of Advanced EducationDemetrios Nicolaides said in a report from the provincial government.
The Calgary region sits at the top spot with the most allocated funds from the Targeted Enrolment Expansionprogram with $84.7 million which means that there will be more than 3,000 new seats in the city’s post-secondary institutions.
“Alberta at Work supports people at every stage of their career path and post-secondary education is a critical step for many people. This major investment in training and education will help students pursue their dreams while ensuring that Albertans develop the necessary skills for the jobs of today and into the future,” Minister of Labour and Immigration Kaycee Madu said in the same report.
The program included many economic sectors when it came to choosing which programs and institutions to fund. The technology sector received the highest allocated funding with more than $48 million, which was followed by the business admin and management sector with more than $46 million and the nursing sector with more than $20 million.
Through this program, 26 publicly-funded post-secondary institutions in Alberta were asked to submit proposals to “expand capacity in their highest demand programs”. The office of advanced education received 21 proposals from 23 institutions.
The office of advanced education looked at each proposal with rigorous evaluation and used measurements such as workforce needs in key sectors, learner demand, financial implications, cost per seat, regional need, work-integrated learning pathways and the ability to get students into programs this fall. They also used labour market demand from provincial data sources institutional employment data and their own data analysis.
