NAIT has proposed a two per cent domestic tuition increase for the 2025/26 year. The tuition increase, along with NAIT’s 2025/26 budget, was approved by NAIT’s Board of Governors at their meeting on March 4. The budget still needs to be approved by the Advanced Education Minister.
The two per cent increase is in line with Alberta’s tuition framework, which specifies that “unless an exceptional increase has been applied…an institution-level cap is set at no more than two per cent at most public post-secondary institutions.”
“We do pass some of that back on the students, particularly when we’re in a very resource constrained environment,” said NAIT’s VP Academic Peter Leclaire. “Just keeping in line with all institutions across the province from what I understand, but mindful of the fact that we’re trying to provide a great polytechnic education for those students.”
Jenna Luczak, NAITSA’s President, said that NAITSA was “very satisfied” with the proposed numbers.
“We understand that the institution is under a lot of financial strain right now, with the government decreasing funding and stuff like that. So we were reasonable and understanding that they [NAIT] do need that 2 per cent,” she told the Nugget.
International tuition is also planned to increase by an average of 2.9 per cent. Some programs will see higher increases, like Petroleum Engineering Technology, which according to NAIT’s tuition and fees webpage, increased by 34 per cent from $39,858 in 2024/25 to $53,655 in 2025/26. Other programs saw a marked decrease, like Denturist Technology, which decreased 28 per cent; in 2024/25 international tuition was $101,166, and in 2025/26 it will cost $72,930 to complete the program.
International tuition is not subject to the same regulations as domestic, but NAIT did also consult with NAITSA on the proposed increases. “We don’t need to be in consultation for the international students, but we really appreciated that,” Luczak shared.
Meaningful consultation ongoing
As a requirement of the Post-Secondary Learning Act, NAIT must meaningfully consult with NAITSA on new domestic tuition increases, with a minimum of two meetings per year.
In 2022, after NAITSA filed for a judicial review of NAIT’s tuition model, the Court of King’s Bench ruled that “the Board did not engage in meaningful consultation with the Students’ Association before making the Decision.”
In this year’s consultation, Luczak said that NAIT “met the minimum required two consultation meetings for tuition and MNIFs [mandatory non-instructional fees].”
Leclaire believes that NAIT met their requirement to meaningfully consult. “We provided all the necessary information as well as how it would impact each individual program.”
“Would we like to have more dialogue on it? Yeah, you know, we do. But I think we met the standard on there and that’s why they [the students] were comfortable in supporting it.”
No new mandatory fees
Due to missed timelines, NAIT will not increase any MNIFs or introduce new ones in the upcoming year. The institution is legally required to seek approval for new MNIFs, according to the Post-Secondary Learning Act and NAIT’s policy SR 4.2, Student Consultation on Mandatory Non-Instructional Fees. The policy states that “consultation meetings will be held during the fall term (up to four meetings, as required, but no less than two meetings).”
“Within the procedure itself, we were supposed to share information in September and then start the dialogue in the new year. We didn’t share that information on those timelines,” said Leclaire. “When we got into those conversations, the students didn’t feel comfortable. The Board felt like we didn’t follow our own policy and procedure, so we made the decision to not increase those fees.”
Currently, NAIT students pay:
- Athletics and recreation fee
- $132.88 per term
- $8.66 per week for apprentices
- OneCard support fee
- $6.46 per term (fall/winter)
- $3.32 per term (spring/summer)
- $0.54 per week for apprentices
- Student technology fee
- $186.34 per term (fall/winter)
- $26.73 per term (spring/summer)
- $12.53 per week for apprentices
