About 40 courses not offered to international students

By: Thandi Vera

The Projector reported Nov. 10 that a student was unable to take Red River College Polytechnic’s Business Administration in Accounting course. In fact, the Business Administration in Accounting course is part of the college’s Business Administration program, of which the student is currently enrolled. We have updated this article to reflect this information.

International students face course limitations at Red River College Polytechnic, driving them to apply for courses they weren’t initially interested in, due to restrictions implemented at the school. 

“As international students we need to pre plan, so that we can take [the] course of our choice, otherwise we have to compromise,” Navjot Dhillon, a first-year Data Science and Machine Learning student at RRC Polytech, said.  

Dhillon recently moved to Winnipeg to attend RRC Polytech, and because of limited course options and restrictions, she said she was forced to take Data Science and Machine Learning.

 “I want to change my course, but I can’t which was a difficult choice, but I have to do this,”  Dhilon said. 

According to the RRC Polytech website, the college offers more than 100 full-time programs for domestic students. International students are limited to about 60 courses.

 International students wait outside the RRC Polytech International Education Centre on Oct. 17, 2022 to speak to the International Student Advisor regarding course requirements. (Thandi Vera)

Education and nursing programs are some examples of courses not offered to international students at the college.

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada permits international students to take these courses.

“The College does not have seats in its nursing program for International students,” said Lauren Parsons, a college spokesperson, in an email. “The reason for this is because the program is in high demand and regularly filled by domestic students. It is competitive, which means every year there are more individuals who apply to the program than the college has seats for.”

The University of Manitoba offers nursing to international students and there are no restrictions for international students, according to their website.