Senate scrutinizes International College of Manitoba at monthly meeting

The U of M senate convened last week for its monthly meeting, where the International College of Manitoba (ICM) presented its annual report on college operations.
David Collins, U of M vice-provost of academic planning and programs, read highlights from the report in the senate chamber. Collins sits on the UM/ICM Academic Advisory Committee, along with three other U of M faculty members and three faculty members from ICM. The ICM Advisory Committee plays an important role in overseeing the activities at the college, and writes a report after each of ICM’s three academic terms.
Enrolment at ICM has grown from 11 students in August 2009 to 144 in August 2013. With it, the number of students going on to study at the U of M has risen from 23 full- and part-time students in 2009-10, to 237 full- and part-time students in 2012-13.
To date, 825 students have graduated from the ICM program. Seventeen per cent of all international students at the U of M were also previously students at the college.
The financial impact this has had on the university is considerable.
“ICM pays a royalty to the university, and in 2012‐13 the royalty payments totalled $1.7 million, bringing the amount paid since ICM’s inception to $4.6 million,” according to the report.
Students at ICM paid $148,000 to the U of M in the form of student service fees in 2012-13, and enrolment in university English-language programs brought in another $238,000. “The dollar value that is generated is significant. [ . . . ] To this point, the university has obtained just over six million dollars from the relationship with ICM,” Collins told the senate.
ICM has been accused in the past of being misleading about the relationship it has with the university.
Students attending ICM pay between $12,480 and $13,395 a year to attend the college’s “pre-university” and “university level” programs.
Susan Prentice, sociology professor at the U of M, raised concerns that students coming from ICM do not have the same success rates as other students in the faculty of arts – typically having marks one full grade point below that of other students.
“One of the main reasons the campus welcomed ICM in was with the promise of accelerated, exceptional, unusual supports to facilitate the integration of international students, and if the outcomes aren’t bearing that out, it raises questions about the efficacy of the program and perhaps the welcome that’s being offered.”