As a McGill University alumna who moved to Montréal to study from outside of Québec, I`ve been paying close attention to the evolving case of the CAQ government’s proposed tuition increases and francisation measures for out-of-province students at Anglophone universities (i.e. McGill, Concordia, and Bishop’s). As of December 14, the most recent proposal includes:

• Set tuition for students from other provinces at $12,000, as of fall 2024. That’s 33 per cent more than they currently pay. The new rate will apply to undergraduates and those enrolled in non-thesis master’s degrees. The government’s initial plan, announced in October, would have almost doubled the out-of-province rate to $17,000.
• Require 80 per cent of students from outside Quebec studying in the province to reach an intermediate level of French by the time they graduate, as of fall 2025. Universities will face financial penalties if the target isn’t met. There are currently no French requirements in Quebec universities.

https://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/quebec-moves-ahead-with-tuition-hike-french-requirements-at-english-universities

Tuition hikes aside (which I agree would have a huge impact on students’ decision-making), I am intrigued by McGill’s reaction to the proposed French language proficiency requirement:

“McGill has actively supported the government’s objective to promote and protect the French language. However, this target is academically and technically unfeasible and will only serve to deter students from coming here,” Saini said.

A student with no previous knowledge of French will require the equivalent of a full semester of classes to reach an intermediate level. Faced with having to take an extra semester to complete their degree, the majority will choose to go elsewhere.

https://www.mcgill.ca/channels/channels/news/mcgill-calls-premier-legault-reverse-decision-citing-devastating-effects-quebec-and-university-353597

I disagree with this reaction, as I think that it presumes a monolingual mindset, meaning that it presumes that the default and desired state of being is to be a monolingual speaker of English only. And so therefore this reaction is built on an erroneous assumption that incoming students would have no interest in learning French, and also underestimates the number of students from the rest of Canada–for example those with a French immersion background, Francophones from outside Québec–who might come to McGill already demonstrating the required level of French (or close to it).

First, let’s look at the what the level of French required would actually be.

In the current proposal, students would be required to achieve a Level 5, or intermediate level, on the Échelle québécoise des niveaux de compétence en français. This 12-level scale was originally conceive as an adaptation of the Canadian Language Benchmarks (CLBs) for the French language in Quebec. I couldn’t find an official benchmarking of the Échelle québécoise to the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) (feel free to share if you have one!), but looking at the descriptors here and in the document itself, it seems like approximately a B1; a CLB 5 benchmarks roughly to a CEFR B1.

What level of proficiency in French do students tend to have coming out of high school in Canada? Canadian Parents for French report on language proficiency outcomes for students studying French, reporting that “Grade 12 students […] attain A2 & B1 in core French; B1 in Extended or Integrated French; B1 in Post-Intensive French; and B1 & B2 in French immersion”. This suggests that if a student has done French immersion through Grade 12, they’d likely meet the the Level 5 requirement, and if they did core French or other modalities, they could meet it or be close. And I think you could assume that i someone did French immersion and switched out sometime in high school, they’d also likely have somewhere in the ballpark of a B1/Level 5.

Therefore, the way I see it, it is unlikely that a majority of students from outside Quebec would come to McGill with zero previous knowledge of French, and therefore necessitate a whole extra semester of study to get to a B1/Level 5. It is more likely the case that many of them would already meet the requirement, or require a few courses that could be worked into their degree as electives, etc.

But just how many students are we talking about? In 2022, just over 22% of McGill’s student body (or 8,843 students) were from the rest of Canada. Statistics Canada reported that in 2021, that outside of Quebec, 3.3% of the population speak French as their first official language. So, for the sake of argument, let’s suppose that we could assume the same proportion in the McGill student body from the rest of Canada: so that would make 8,551 Anglophone students from the rest of Canada at McGill.

But millions of Anglophone students study French as a second language in Canada’s schools every year. According to Statistics Canada, in 2021-22, there were more than 1.2 million students studying core French, and more than 477,000 studying French immersion across Canada outside Quebec. Even looking at just Grade 12, more than 20,000 students were enrolled in Grade 12 French immersion programs in Canada, and more than 15,000 were enrolled in Grade 12 core French programs across the country. And with 267,594 students graduating from high school in Canada outside Quebec per year, around 33% of whom will proceed to university, that means that up to approximately 40% of incoming students from the rest of Canada could have studied French in Grade 12, with the possibility of many more who may have studied it in earlier grades. Additionally, in the 2021 McGill Student Demographic Survey, 72% of McGill students reported having an intermediate, advanced or professional/native fluency in French.

So the number of students from the rest of Canada who would have to extend their degree by a whole additional semester would actually be smaller than it seems.

But regardless of whatever this number may be, the aspect of McGill’s reaction that I object the most to is the assertion that being required to demonstrate proficiency in French will “deter students from coming” to McGill. That may be true if you see the world through a monolingual mindset–“I speak English, why do I need anything else?” But in my case, it was just the opposite.

Believe it or not, some of us actually enjoy languages and language learning! I specifically chose to come to McGill and Montreal. I was a student who had studied extended core French in high school and wanted to continue my French learning both inside and outside the classroom, but wasn’t ready to study in a French-medium institution. So McGill was the perfect place for me, and I took multiple FSL courses during my degree, as did many of my peers. And although I don’t have data to support this, I would suspect that McGill is an attractive destination for the same reason for many French immersion graduates, French-language learning enthusiasts, and perhaps Francophones from minority settings. So a French language proficiency requirement isn’t a big deal–it’s something we would have done anyway.

Not to mention the fact that language proficiency requirements for graduation are commonplace in many parts of the world. Throughout Europe, Asia, Latin America , for example, students must demonstrate a certain level of English (or other foreign languages) in order to graduate.

Of course I understand that there are a million political considerations at play, including issues of control and autonomy. But these aside, I would encourage McGill to look beyond the monolingual mindset in reaction to the most recent proposal from the government, and instead of trying to what I see as a not unreasonable set of requirements for ‘francisation’, focus its efforts on fighting the tuition hikes.