VIU to cut Master of Community Planning program amidst a worker shortage in the industry

Wickland (pictured) said luckily, he was able to get applications into the Master of Planning program at the University of Calgary when the applications were reopened for VIU students. Photo: Lauryn Mackenzie / CHLY 101.7fm

Kyle Wickland was excited when he was accepted to the Master of Community Planning program at Vancouver Island University this year. For him, it was an opportunity to help change the world, just a little.

“So I really wanted to do community planning to try and fix a lot of the issues with cities in North America. They tend to be overly car-dependent, and [for] people who can't drive, it's very hard for them to get around,” Wickland said. “Cities have always really fascinated me. So, figuring out ways on how we can make our cities more livable is something I've always wanted to do.”

But just as he was in the middle of finishing up his Bachelor of Art in Geography, he received an email from the university’s recently appointed acting President, Emily Hunter. His program was one of 13 scheduled to be cancelled in the next two years, part of sweeping cost-cutting measures. Wickland scrambled to figure out if there was still a way he could do a masters program elsewhere.

“But because I was in the midst of doing field studies, it was very stressful to try to get those applications and look at what options are available while trying to do field studies that runs from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., plus an assignment that's due the next day, pretty much every day,” he said. “So that was not the best timing for them.”

The cancellation of MCP and the other programs has led to shock amongst university and professional communities. The cancellations are part of the university's deficit mitigation plan. According to the plan, the university is planning on reducing its spending budget by $18 million and expects to return to a balanced budget by the end of the 2026-2027 fiscal year. 

So far, VIU has already cut a little over $6 million from their budget, with almost $12 million still needed to be cut.

VIU’s handling of its deficit plan has led to several controversies that led to the resignation of the then-president of the university, Deborah Saucier, in April of this year. Sauincer was then replaced by then-chief financial officer and vice-president of administration, Emily Huner, as Acting President.

The school has told students of the Master of Community Planning program, the program will remain open until the end of June 2026 for students to finish their degree. While the final decision still hasn't been made on whether or not the program can stay, some students feel like they are in limbo as they await the results.

Deraek Menard is a current MCP student at VIU. He just finished his first year and was expecting to complete his masters in spring 2026.

But for Menard, while his cohort was told they have until the end of the next school year to finish the remaining classes they need to graduate, due to health reasons, it has affected the number of classes he can take at a time.

“I'm recovering from a concussion. Very long-term situation here. I've had the concussion for over a year and a half now, and it's made it difficult last semester,” Menard said. “The program getting cancelled is actually a really terrible thing for me, actually, because I had to drop a couple of courses this last semester in order to get a reasonable performance out of the ones that I had left.”

He said he still needs to reach out to VIU and the Master of Community Planning program to find out if he would even be able to catch up with the missing classes before next Summer if the program does get cancelled.

“I would say cutting a planning program during a planner shortage is like closing med school in the middle of a pandemic,” said Emilie K. Adin, the president of the Planning Institute of BC.

She has been working in the industry since the late 1990s after attending school at UBC.

She said right now there is a growing demand for registered planners in the province, and the one thing the industry does not need right now is a strong planning program like the one at VIU to shut down.

“We already have a shortage, and so we need more people trained in planning and not fewer, and it is a longer process to become a registered professional planner if you don't get your education at an accredited school,” Adin said. “Imagine telling people who want to build better communities, say younger British Columbians, or those wanting to change their careers, ‘sorry, go study elsewhere if you can afford it.’ It makes sense to have the programs in British Columbia to serve the communities of British Columbia.”

Pam Shaw is the director of the Master of Community Planning program and was one of the creators of the program at VIU ten years ago.

“Over the last 10 years, seeing the incredible success of our alumni–I mean, it's devastating news for anyone to hear that the program was being considered for being cut,” Shaw said.

Shaw said she first got an inkling that the program might be in trouble when the university’s financial straights became apparent. 

When VIU first announced that the Master of Arts in Sustainable Leisure Management would be getting cut, she feared her program might be next. 

“There's no money for graduate programs at VIU from the provincial government. So it's entirely cost recovery,” she said. “It's a system that makes sense if everything stays constant, right? So if the inflationary factor that's put on tuition is the same as all other factors coming into the program, then this is where the cost recovery model doesn't work.

Shaw explained that tuition is the only financial input for the program. While the program is currently able to keep going on the current model for a while, as domestic post-secondary tuition fees are capped at a 2 per cent annual increase, it may become harder for the program to keep up with the price of inflation and other necessary costs.

“Then the final change was that the program pays an administration fee to VIU,” Shaw said. “So 25 per cent of the budget at the end of the year would go back to the university for all the services we use at VIU, because we're taking up space, we're using power, we're using other staff resources in the library and the research center.”

The MCP program is a two-year program that is fully accredited through the Canadian Institute of Planners and the Planning Institute of BC.

Currently in British Columbia, there are four schools that offer some type of planning program that is recognized by the Canadian Institute of Planners and the Planning Institute of BC: the University of British Columbia, the University of Northern BC, Simon Fraser University, and Vancouver Island University.

While other schools focus on building urban cities with cars, skyscrapers and infrastructure, VIU's planning program is tailored to the needs of Vancouver Island with the vast different communities and landscapes it has.

Shaw said it is a detriment for the island to lose the only planning program on the island.

“It's a place that has real edges, and what we do here has impacts on how we live in this place today and how we'll live here in the future,” she said. “So it's the idea of creating a planning program that is built around this idea of finite, around sustainability, thinking about what's true for the island, small communities, urban, rural interface. There are over 50 nations on Vancouver Island, so that, again, makes it a very different, interesting complex, layers and layers of understanding to this place.”

For students like Wickland, he said he wishes that if the school had known they were wanting to cancel the program, they would have announced it sooner, so they had more time to look at their options and figure out if they wanted to apply elsewhere. 

Wickland said, luckily, he was able to get an application into the Master of Planning program at the University of Calgary when the applications were reopened for the incoming VIU students. He said if the program at VIU is cancelled, he is hopeful he can get into the program at the University of Calgary. 

But moving to Calgary to attend the program will mean additional costs, such as housing that he wouldn't have to pay if he attended school in Nanaimo and could live at home.

The VIU Board of Governors will give final approval on the program cuts next week on June 3.

According to VIU, if approved by the board, the “affected programs will be cancelled, and VIU will no longer accept new applications to those programs. If not approved, the programs will continue.”

So now students at VIU, such as Deraek Menard and Kyle Wickland, await to see what their future will hold for them at VIU

“I don't know exactly what the plan is to make that happen, or if I'm just going to end up with nine-tenths of a degree because VIU decided to cancel this so suddenly,” Menard said.

VIU states more information will be shared with the community by June 5, including support available for those affected by the cancellations if approved.

Funding Note: This story was produced with funding support from the Local Journalism Initiative, administered by the Community Radio Fund of Canada.