03-04-2019, 11:18 AM
Remember too that the vast majority of Waterloo students aren't coming from local high schools, and especially for a program like Systems Engineering - the school has global name recognition in Mathematics and Engineering and draws from many places. It means that it's a population already willing to leave their home for schooling and are likely to be more mobile in general.
70% leaving the country is significant, and some of those folks are definitely Canadians, but without knowing the intake values, the outflow ones are not as meaningful as they may seem. It would also be worth comparing the numbers at Laurier (especially for Business programs) and Conestoga. I'd suspect Laurier also sees a lot of folks leave the area, but Conestoga grads seem more likely to stay local.
I've asked a fair number of folk - in HR in the tech community, as well as some connected to Communitech - if they have any insight into the intake numbers (which percentage are from Waterloo Region, Ontario, Canada and International) and I've never gotten a definite answer. I don't have anyone at the school itself that I know well enough to ask directly but I don't think those numbers are published or broadcast.
Some of that difference of availability is because it's much more interesting to generate and promote the brain drain narrative. I'm not suggesting the narrative is false, just that it's a good, reliable, long-lived story and so more work has been done to surface and publicize numbers that support it because they're regularly included.
70% leaving the country is significant, and some of those folks are definitely Canadians, but without knowing the intake values, the outflow ones are not as meaningful as they may seem. It would also be worth comparing the numbers at Laurier (especially for Business programs) and Conestoga. I'd suspect Laurier also sees a lot of folks leave the area, but Conestoga grads seem more likely to stay local.
I've asked a fair number of folk - in HR in the tech community, as well as some connected to Communitech - if they have any insight into the intake numbers (which percentage are from Waterloo Region, Ontario, Canada and International) and I've never gotten a definite answer. I don't have anyone at the school itself that I know well enough to ask directly but I don't think those numbers are published or broadcast.
Some of that difference of availability is because it's much more interesting to generate and promote the brain drain narrative. I'm not suggesting the narrative is false, just that it's a good, reliable, long-lived story and so more work has been done to surface and publicize numbers that support it because they're regularly included.