Getting ready for five-digit dialing

Five-digit dialing is coming to the University of Waterloo next summer.

"All the campus extensions will be changing to five-digit numbers in August 2006 to enable Telephone Services to provide voice services to new buildings and additions to old buildings," said Bruce Uttley, Senior Technologist, Computer Telephony Integration, in UW's Information Systems and Technology department.

He explained that the "Five-Digit Dialing Conversion" is a direct result of the rapid growth of the university. New buildings on campus, the School of Architecture building in Cambridge and the upcoming common dialing plan with St Jerome's University have resulted in a significant decrease in the pool of available phone numbers.

"We are reassigning extension numbers after only two or three months, much more quickly than is desirable. With the addition of the School of Pharmacy, the new Quantum-Nano building, the Sharcnet facility, plus building additions in other areas, the situation will be untenable."

The solution is to move to five-digit dialing on campus. The evening of Tuesday August 8, 2006 is the target date to change the campus dialing plan from four to five-digit numbers. All extensions and voicemail boxes will be changed with a minimal interruption in service. For details, visit the five-digit dialing website.

"While some details still remain to be sorted out, experience suggests that making the transition is most successful if those who will be affected are informed well in advance," Uttley said.

For most campus phones, the new five-digit extension number will be the current number with a "3" added at the beginning. Direct-in-Dial (DID) extensions will have a leading "8" added to match the DID number 519-888-4xxx.

As well next summer, the 10-digit local dialing will come into effect for the 519 Area Code in Southwestern Ontario. You can use 10-digit dialing for all local communication today, but starting on June 17, 2006 you'll receive a recorded reminder and on Oct. 14, 10-digit dialing will be mandatory.

Low-income students receive grants

The Ontario government and the Canada Millennium Scholarship Foundation have teamed up to provide about 16,000 first-year college and university students from low-income families in the province with grants of up to $3,000 toward their education.

"This new grant is part of the package of improvements to financial aid for students included in Reaching Higher – the McGuinty Government Plan for Postsecondary Education," Chris Bentley, the Ontario Minister of Training, Colleges and Universities, told students at the University of Toronto on Tuesday.

"This program is a significant part of our plan to make it easier for 135,000 low- and middle-income students to get a postsecondary education. We are pleased the foundation is helping us achieve our goal."

Starting this year, up to16,000 students entering their first year of college or university will benefit from the Millennium-Ontario Access Grant.

Student leaders applauded the announcement. "Students have been without an Ontario grants program since the early 1990s when former Ontario Premier Bob Rae eliminated them," said Jesse Greener, Ontario Chairperson of the Canadian Federation of Students.

"Coupled with the tuition fee freeze, today's announcement is a step forward in improving access to higher education for low-income students."

"These new grants are a welcome move. They are a great first step towards addressing rising student debt by placing greater emphasis on non-repayable forms of student assistance," said Stephanie Murray, President, Ontario Undergraduate Student Alliance (OUSA).

She added: "While this announcement demonstrates Ontario’s commitment to accessible higher education, the provincial government must also continue to carefully control student costs, we urge the government to introduce a permanent effective freeze on tuition fees to ensure the accessibility, affordability and predictability of costs for Ontario’s students."

According to the Canadian Federation of Students, when the Ontario grant program was eliminated in 1993-94, the number of students who borrowed more than $5,000 for higher education quadrupled from about over 40,000 in 1992-93 to over 163,000 the following year.

"Today's student debt crisis has its roots in the 1990s with the elimination of grants and ever-rising tuition fees," said Greener. "Without grants, students in need had to rely exclusively on debt to finance the tuition fee hikes that characterized the subsequent 10 years."

The $100-million, joint initiative by the Ontario government and the foundation marks a shift in student financial aid by delivering more resources to students with the lowest family income.

It will provide eligible students up to half the cost of their tuition to a maximum of $3,000. When combined with the Canada Access Grant – the federal government's new low-income grant – these students can receive up to $6,000, or the full cost  of their first year of tuition.

First-year students from low-income families will be automatically considered for the new grants when they apply for aid through the Ontario Student Assistance Program (OSAP).

For second-year students, the Ontario government is funding the new Ontario Access Grant (OAG). Like the Millennium-Ontario grant, the OAG will provide up to $3,000 for students from low-income families.

Students can find out more information about OSAP by visiting its website or through the financial aid office of the postsecondary institution they plan to attend.

"Our organization has been looking at ways to improve access of students from low-income families to postsecondary education," said Norman Riddell, executive director and chief executive officer of the scholarship foundation. "Over the four-year course of this project, we will be testing whether providing low-income students with more non-repayable grants improves their presence in postsecondary education."

The foundation will provide $76 million over four years to support theMillennium-Ontario Access Grant, with the remainder paid by the province. The new grant is on top of the $108 million in Millennium bursaries the foundation has been distributing annually to Ontario students since 2000. The foundation is an independent organization created by an Act of Parliament in 1998.

"Future graduates will play an important role in Canadian society, both socially and economically," said Belinda Stronach, Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development and Minister responsible for Democratic Renewal. "The Government of Canada is proud to partner with the Canada Millennium Scholarship Foundation and the Government of Ontario to help students reach their full potential and acquire the skills they need to meet their career objectives."

Data from Statistics Canada's Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics in 2000 shows that among Ontario families with 18- to 24-year olds, participation in postsecondary education increases steadily as parental income increases. This increase is driven mostly by university participation – 18- to 24-year olds from the highest income quartile are more than twice as likely to attend university as those from the lowest quartile.

In order to increase the participation rates of those from low-income families, the new Millennium-Ontario Access Grant represents a shift in the way student financial aid is delivered by providing resources on the basis of the level of income of the student's family.

Recipients will be asked to participate in follow-up studies designed to improve the understanding of the challenges facing low-income students and the effectiveness of different forms of student aid.

The new grant is also part of the package of improvements to financial aid for students included in Reaching Higher: The McGuinty Government Plan for Postsecondary Education, which was unveiled in the 2005 Budget.

Through the plan, the government will invest $6.2 billion more in Ontario’s postsecondary system over the next five years – the largest multi-year investment in 40 years. This includes $1.5 billion more for student aid, which will be used to:

• Join with the federal government to expand eligibility for student loans and increase Ontario weekly loan amounts from $110 to $140 for single students starting this year;
• Reduce how much money middle-income parents are expected to contribute to their children's education, expand interest relief and recognize computer costs in student loan needs assessment;
• Provide $50 million annually to match funds raised by colleges and universities to establish endowments for student financial assistance;
  
• Continue to work with the federal government to broaden and expand student aid in 2006-07.

C&PA