The professional mandate of Canada’s Immigration, Refugee and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) division is to construct “a stronger Canada through immigration programs, citizenship services, refugee protection and issuing Canadian travel documents.”
However our analysis presentations how IRCC has change into a formidable pressure in Canadian training coverage — a space that’s the duty of provinces and territories.
Because the Immigration and Refugee Coverage Act was once enacted in 2002 and the World Pupil Program was once advanced, IRCC has been answerable for overseeing world scholars who come to Canada.
Since 2022, alternatively, IRCC’s position in upper training coverage has change into extra marked because it an increasing number of makes use of laws to regulate and regulate the World Pupil Program. An important coverage alternate took place in January 2024 when the government imposed an unparalleled cap on world pupil enrolments.
Intensifying geopolitical occasions in recent times are without delay impacting IRCC. New wars and conflicts, along side ongoing democratic backsliding and political/social turmoil world wide, have had rapid penalties for upper training in Canada.
To raised perceive IRCC’s policymaking on world scholars, formed by way of each home priorities and world geopolitical pressures, we analyzed coverage bulletins by way of IRCC between January 2022 and July 2025 on Canada’s world commitments.
Even supposing public-facing bulletins seem technical and impartial, we discovered that IRCC’s statements on other geopolitical problems have been inconsistent, reinforcing inequalities within the governance of world scholars in Canada.
Scholars stroll in opposition to an indication at Trinity Western College in Langley, B.C.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jonathan Hayward
Offering humanitarian reinforce
We discovered that IRCC constantly describes Canada as a “safe haven” for world scholars suffering from humanitarian crises of their coverage responses.
But, our analysis signifies that IRCC’s coverage alternatives give a contribution to the inequalities world scholars enjoy. Now not all world scholars who’ve lived via humanitarian crises or political threats have the similar get admission to to the “safe haven” that IRCC heralds Canada as being.
Usually, IRCC adjusts insurance policies to permit affected world scholars to stay in Canada. In some circumstances, it additionally makes use of the World Pupil Program as a mechanism to confess other folks from impacted areas.
In 2022, inside a month of the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine struggle, IRCC established the Canada-Ukraine Authorization Trip Program to permit Ukrainians to return to Canada briefly and paintings and find out about all over their keep.
Through April 2024, this system had authorized greater than 960,000 packages and welcomed round 300,000 Ukrainians to settle in Canada. Even supposing this program is now closed to new packages, IRCC has frequently up to date comparable insurance policies for particular candidates’ standing extensions, with the most recent replace in March 2026.
In 2024, in line with the Israeli genocide in Gaza, IRCC additionally carried out particular immigration measures for world scholars, that have been introduced virtually 3 months after the assault on Gaza started and integrated each Palestinians and Israelis.
The particular circulation for Palestinians got here with stipulations: a cap of five,000 transient customer visas for Palestinians with circle of relatives ties in Canada most effective, letting them observe for world pupil standing and to escape to Canada. This particular circulation was once closed after 4 months as packages reached the cap.
Palestinians have a look at the destruction after an Israeli strike on a residential construction in Rafah, Gaza Strip in March 2024.
(AP Picture/Hatem Ali)
Selling ‘Canadian values’
Canada’s international coverage schedule, closing formally reviewed in 2005, emphasizes values associated with liberal democracy and the rustic’s peacekeeping legacy. Those “Canadian values” have come into play in IRCC’s responses to human rights violations in Iran and Hong Kong.
In 2023, IRCC presented a brand new measure to reinforce Iranian world scholars in Canada amid escalating political tensions in Iran. It introduced standing extensions to scholars going through rapid threat again house with out an utility charge.
Moreover, the Canadian govt has criticized the Iranian govt’s crackdown on protesters and imposed sanctions on Iran, together with restrictions on instructional actions and analysis collaborations.
In a similar way, IRCC was once occupied with fresh threats to Hong Kong’s democratic gadget posed by way of China’s nationwide safety regulation. Reasonably than without delay commenting at the govt, because it did relating to Iran, IRCC framed its bulletins round some great benefits of recruiting Hong Kong citizens to Canada’s labour marketplace, the usage of this emphasis to reinforce its broader rationale of selling democracy and freedom in Hong Kong.
This was once accomplished by way of increasing the eligibility standards for Hong Kong world graduates to use for an open paintings allow and particular everlasting residency streams.
Those other protections are tied to Canada’s world members of the family insurance policies and formed by way of scholars’ backgrounds, together with their world/Canadian reviews.
Contradictions in coverage and discourse
The World Pupil Program displays a deeper contradiction in Canada’s technique to world scholars. Canada encourages world scholars to return right here and reinforce financial expansion. Then again, the ones scholars at the moment are additionally blamed for abusing the gadget and exacerbating pressures on social products and services and housing.
For instance, a contemporary Space of Commons document recommended world scholars misuse asylum claims and advisable a cap on candidates from international locations with prime pupil utility charges, reminiscent of India, Nigeria, and the Republic of Guinea.
There may be an pressing want for extra equitable insurance policies. The way in which IRCC connects geopolitics and home problems with pupil recruitment legitimizes discriminatory immigration screening in keeping with scholars’ race, ethnicity and nationality.
Present caps have resulted in a discount of greater than 60 in line with cent in world pupil enrolment. But, the hot Auditor Common document confirmed an important build up in scholars from Eu international locations even after the enrolment cap was once carried out.
A choice for an equitable method
Our analysis additionally signifies that world scholars’ reviews are being essentially impacted by way of IRCC’s coverage approaches in ways in which move well past find out about allows.
In 2026, the Auditor Common closely criticized IRCC’s World Pupil Program reforms and highlighted the ineffectiveness of coverage adjustments aimed toward bettering this system, such because the enrollment cap and provincial/territorial find out about allow allocations.
Our analysis means that the failure of reforms to believe and deal with world pupil get admission to to humanitarian protections via this system creates additional obstacles and inequities.
The pointy decline in pupil arrivals underscores the desire for better responsibility and transparency in immigration processes, in addition to extra equitable coverage frameworks that bear in mind the lived reviews of world scholars.
