The heartbreaking layoff waves have swept Ontario’s public sector colleges. Sounding the alarm on the issue, a union released details suggesting that the institutions in question were collectively facing a loss of 10,000 jobs.
As of June, 19 colleges reportedly signalled that their staff reduction had soared to a total of more than 8,000 employees. However, these figures missed out on some other unaddressed college layoff data. And so, the final number is expected to climb up to the big 10,000 mark.
The briefing on the future of the province’s colleges comes after reports that more than 600 college programs have been cut. Experts see an alarming decline in the enrollment of the international students as the main reason behind the layoffs and program cuts.
Decline in Indian students in Canada?
Earlier this year, Immigration Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) data, as also quoted by the Indian Express, showed a significant decline in the issuance rate of study permits to Indian nationals. Numbers recorded in the first quarter – between January and March – were down by 31% as only 30,640 Indian students received study permits. On the contrary, 44,295 from the same pool of people secured them during the same months in 2024.
Much like US’ immigration crackdown, these slumping figures in Canada also reflected a harsh path for international student admissions. In an attempt to ease the pressure on housing, healthcare and other services, Canada set its study permits cap at 437,000 in 2025, marking a 10% drop from 2024. As per the data revealed so earlier, the country had already issued a total of 96,015 (and now presumably even more) study permits in early 2025, slipping from last year’s 1,21,070.
According to a 2023 New York Times report, more than 60% of international students in Ontario’s public colleges come from India. Thereafter, a separate IRCC report confirmed that nearly 20,000 Indian nationals remained a “no-show” at their designated Canadian institutions in the months of March and April.
‘One of the largest mass layoffs in Ontario’s history’
“We’re seeing one of the largest mass layoffs in Ontario’s history,” Ontario Public Service Employees Union President JP Hornick said at a press conference outside Toronto’s Centennial College’s Story Arts Centre campus. “This is bigger than the Hudson’s Bay liquidation, which laid off 8,000 employees across Canada.”
Issuing a warning of the trouble ahead for Ontario’s public colleges, the union representing about 55,000 college faculty and support staff said the impending layoffs would result in generational impacts.
“We need strong colleges today for the accessible, low-barrier job training that they offer, especially in the face of trade wars that are undercutting and restructuring our economy,” Hornick went on. “But instead we are bleeding jobs,” he highlighted, noting that about 1.5 million Ontarions (nearly 1 in 10) have witnessed a campus being shut down in their community.
According to a arbitration decision revealed by the union, 23 out of Ontario’s 24 public sector colleges reported a 48% fall in these numbers between September 2023 and the following year.
Ontario officials vs Ontario Public Service Employees Union
Ontario Public Service Employees Union even alleged that the Ontario government “never intended” to inform the public of the disturbing extent of the layoffs and program cuts. The union’s president further accused the province of underfunding post-secondary education.
Countering these claims, a spokesperson for Colleges and Universities Minister Nolan Quinn dismissed the allegations as “baseless and categorically false.” As opposed to mentions of college funding issues, Bianca Giacoboni said that in the last 14 months alone, officials have “provided unprecedented amounts of new funding to our publicly-assisted post-secondary sector, with over $2 billion in new funding into our colleges and universities, on top of the $5 billion we put into the sector every year.”
Moreover, the spokesperson informed Canadian outlet CBC that a college funding model review is scheduled to commence this summer.
Centennial College also challenged OPSEU’s claims that it had dropped more than 100 programs, saying that it had only suspended 54 in 2025.
