Domestic enrolment helped U of W’s fiscal health: president

The University of Winnipeg’s financial situation has stabilized following 10 months of cutbacks on the downtown campus.

“We’re confident we’ll have a balanced budget this year, and we’re very happy about that,” said Todd Mondor, the U of W’s president and vice-chancellor.

Mondor attributed the “stable” position to a rise in domestic enrolment and “better than expected” 2025-26 registration among international students.

An influx of cash has also provided some relief, he said. The province recently topped up the school’s annual funding by $2.5 million and it was gifted $5 million from the Mastercard Foundation.

U of W has registered 190 more domestic undergraduate students (a 13 per cent increase) compared to the fall 2024 term.

International enrolment has dropped by 70 (a nearly 40 per cent year-over-year decrease).

Last fall, when the federal government’s crackdown on non-Canadian students began, the university welcomed 90 fewer registrants (a 34 per cent drop).

Tuition-related losses were repeatedly cited as senior administration’s rationale for budget cuts last year.

A mid-year hiring freeze, discretionary spending limits and the axing of both the women’s soccer team and English Language Program, shook students and staff alike.

Also last year, the president’s office hired a Toronto-based consulting firm to analyze how Manitoba funds local universities.

Mondor lobbied the government after Higher Education Strategy Associates found that the U of W, known for a large undergraduate population and wide-ranging humanities courses, was “significantly disadvantaged” by the status-quo funding of schools based on their academic programs.

The Free Press obtained a breakdown of the university’s spending on third-party consultants during a school year marked by frequent warnings about serious budget constraints.

U of W spent nearly $350,000 to obtain various forms of “expertise or strategic advice,” a document prepared in response to a freedom of information request said.

Various consultants — Show and Tell Agency Inc., Higher Education Strategy Associates, Rodych Integrated Design Inc. and KPMG LLP — were paid about $115,000, $95,000, $73,000 and $61,000, respectively.

The costliest contract was awarded to a Winnipeg-based marketing agency to do a rebranding exercise and oversee an “institutional awareness campaign” with billboards and other ads promoting “UWIN.”

U of W’s president defended those line items, saying they supported “critical functions” of the U of W and included one-off expenses, such as input on a new strategic plan.

Mondor also called them “really modest” bills, given they represented a combined 0.2 per cent of the operating budget.

The board of regents approved a $175.5-million budget, which included a 3.5 per cent increase to domestic tuition and seven per cent hike in international fees, in June.

(Asked about the cost of operating the now-discontinued soccer team to contextualize last year’s budget priorities, Mondor said it was at least $200,000.)

Other local post-secondary institutes’ respective 2024-25 expenditures on consultants were not readily available.

Faculty association president Peter Miller said he’s skeptical about the tangible gains of these contracts and whether there were truly no internal experts available to carry out these projects.

“It’s always tricky to judge the return on investment on advertising,” Miller said. “A lot of our students come from Winnipeg and Manitoba. How many of them would’ve come here anyway (without seeing UWIN billboards)?”

He noted that if there is a reason to be optimistic about the current fiscal situation, senior administration has yet to be communicated to the community.

While the resumption of faculty-level hiring for academics has brought about “cautious optimism,” he noted that contract instructors continue to face “a lot of pressure and cuts.”

A whistleblower with evidence of alleged wrongdoing among U of W’s highest ranks approached the Manitoba Ombudsman’s office in the spring.

The university employee’s six-page complaint urged an independent investigator to probe spending on external consultants, among other things.

The ombudmsan’s office has yet to decide whether it will investigate the complaint further under Manitoba’s whistleblower law.

Mondor said he had not been contacted by an investigator as of Friday.

maggie.macintosh@freepress.mb.ca