Students in Sheridan College’s Honours Bachelor of Creative Writing and Publishing program are not taking the news that their program has been suspended by the college lightly, and have launched a letter-writing campaign to save the program and petition the college to reverse its decision.

Since launching the campaign last week, organizers have been busy gathering support from students, previous writers-in-residence, and others in the CanLit community. 

Sheridan College announced on Nov. 26 that it was suspending 40 programs and conducting “efficiency reviews” on an additional 27 programs “to ensure financial sustainability.” The school has campuses in Mississauga, Oakville, and Brampton, Ontario. 

Students already enrolled in the affected programs will be able to complete their studies, but the programs are not accepting any first-year students, effective immediately. The school says it is in the process of contacting prospective students who have applied to the suspended programs.

Sheridan president and vice chancellor Janet Morrison said in a statement that the school’s enrolment projections show a 30 per cent drop in students “in the coming years,” which will result in a $112 million budget shortfall in the next fiscal year. 

Sheridan is one of many post-secondary institutions facing revenue shortfalls after the federal government announced this fall that it was reducing the number of international study permit applications it will process. 

Faculty in the affected programs were informed of the changes at a town hall meeting last week with no warning. Students similarly received no advance notice.

Ari Subala, a third-year student in the four-year Creative Writing & Publishing program, was working a shift at her job in nearby Square One when a peer told her the news that their program was being suspended. After talking over the sudden and surprising news with her peers, Subala says a group of students decided a letter-writing campaign was a way to get their message to the people making the decisions, putting to use the writing skills they have been honing as part of their studies.

Beyond the industry knowledge and practical skills the program affords its students, Subala points to the larger effect the program has on the wider community, and its role in building a vibrant literary culture and community in Mississauga. The program supports The Ampersand Review, a literary magazine, as well as a literary festival launched last year.

“We’ve contributed a lot to the literary scene in Mississauga – why would they want to give that up instead of nurturing it and honing it to live up to the potential that it has?” Subala says. “It’s a family, and it’s such a shame to see it go down like this, because it’s done so much for the community and for Sheridan.”

Cassidy McFadzean, the current writer-in-residence at Sheridan, says she was inspired by the students’ quick decision to take “tangible action” while the news was still fresh and shocking. 

McFadzean joined the campaign, and has been working with students to spread the word among the broader literary community. All previous writers-in-residence at Sheridan have voiced their support for the program, including Naben Ruthnum, Liz Howard, and Kate Cayley, as have writers such as Waubgeshig Rice and Canisia Lubrin who have read or taught at the program. 

“We need programs like this in order to ensure that we have diversity in publishing,” McFadzean says. “The program is very diverse, not just racially and in terms of cultural background, but also in terms of numerous students who are LGBTQ, who are experiencing disabilities – if we want a diverse CanLit, we really need to give those students the job training and experience to break into publishing.”