A new pathway to Ryerson for international students

In October 2019, Ryerson released its first Internationalization Strategy, which established our commitment to becoming a leading innovation university with a global reach. As part of this strategy, the university intends to increase our number of international students. With one of the smallest international student populations (7.2 per cent) among universities in Ontario, it is the university’s goal to reach the Ontario universities’ average of total international students (15 per cent) in the next five to 10 years.

In order to support the university in achieving this goal, the university has engaged Navitas (external link) , a major provider of international student support that has 32 in-country offices around the world, and more than 25 years of experience.

Increasing our total international student enrolments will benefit the university in a number of ways:

• Expanding the total number of international students will enrich our classrooms by bringing a global perspective to classroom discussions. By providing differing points of views international students will help to develop cross-cultural competencies for all students to prepare them to be global leaders.
• In 2019, the provincial government froze tuition fees and froze the total number of domestic student enrolments. Increasing our international enrolment is a revenue generating opportunity for the university, which will allow the university to cover costs and respond to inflationary pressures.
  
• Increased international partnerships enrich the university experience of Canadian students and faculty by expanding connections, collaborations and new opportunities for partnerships and placements around the world.
  

The partnership under consideration would see Ryerson and Navitas create an additional pathway program where international students would complete their first year of studies and, on successful completion, have a defined pathway into a selection of Ryerson degree programs. International students not connected to the Navitas program would continue to have the option of applying to Ryerson programs directly.

Preliminary discussions, fact finding, and campus visits to existing university partnership sites have been encouraging. It is now time to turn to our broader Ryerson community to discuss the potential partnership and receive the community’s feedback.

Students, faculty and staff will have the opportunity to ask questions, share their perspectives, and learn more about the partnership that is being explored at the following town hall sessions:

Thursday, February 13, 12:30 - 1:30 p.m., TRS 2129

Thursday February 27, 4:30 - 5:30 p.m., ENG LG04

These community consultations are the next important step as Ryerson continues to assess potentially partnering with Navitas on an international student pathway program.

Learn more about Ryerson’s Internationalization Strategy on the Ryerson International website.