Board of Governors and Senate highlights: October 2025

The Board of Governors and Senate held their first meeting of the year respectively on Sept. 24 and Oct. 3.

At the Senate meeting, President Graham Carr gave an overview of the university’s fall enrolment numbers, confirming the trends he had spoken about ten days prior to Board members.

New registrations for fall 2025 are slightly higher than they were for fall 2024, thanks to a significant growth in Quebec registrations. This is partly due to a temporary demographic bubble where a higher number of students are graduating from CEGEP, the president said, as well as Concordia’s heavier focus on Quebec in last year’s recruitment efforts.

Carr also thanked the departments and faculties for accelerating the acceptance process of applicants and increasing the conversion rate to registration, which also contributed to this year’s overall figures. “I can’t thank the community enough for the efforts put in to get us to this point,” he said.

Shrinking international student presence

New registrations from international students continued to fall significantly this year compared to last year, when Concordia had already suffered a major drop. The president emphasized that the impact of the Canadian and Quebec public policies is compounded by “horrendous delays” and complex processes around the delivery of federal study visas and the provincial Certificat d’acceptation du Québec. “We are struggling with a new factor in the immigration process, which is complete unpredictability,” Carr said.

The repercussions are devastating on four fronts, Carr told Board members. The policies are already having a profound financial impact on universities and on Quebec and Canada’s reputation abroad. They will also make university communities far less diverse and, importantly, take a huge toll on the research productivity of universities, as 50 per cent of graduate students were international students prior to 2024-2025.

The Quebec government is holding hearings this month as part of its pluri-annual immigration planning and Concordia will participate.

Most successful fundraising campaign in Concordia’s history closes

At both meetings, Carr highlighted some recent successes and accolades, including recent Emmy Award wins by Concordia graduates.

The John Molson School of Business was named the best business school in Canada in the Bloomberg Businessweek’s 2025-2026 rankings. 

To Board members, he mentioned the launch of PLAN/NET ZERO’s pilot project, a major renovation of the GM Building, and a new climate-action partnership.

To Senate, he spoke about Space Concordia’s successful rocket launch in August, the first space launch from Canadian soil in more than 25 years and the first ever achieved by a student team. He noted in particular the inspiring collaboration the student group forged with the Cree community of Mistissini that made the accomplishment possible.

Finally, he thanked the donors, alumni, volunteers and staff who contributed to the success of the Campaign for Concordia: Next-Gen Now, which concluded on September 25 after raising $365M, surpassing both its original target of $250M and more recent $350M goal.

Academic updates and decisions

In addition to the interim provost’s written report, senators received the annual academic hearing report, which details the number and types of charges laid under the Academic Code of Conduct, and their disposition.

From July 1, 2024, to June 30, 2025, a total of 270 incidents were reported, 84 per cent of which were upheld at the faculty level and 12 per cent dismissed, while decisions are still pending in 4 per cent of cases. The Office of Student Tribunals conducted hearings related to 39 cases.

Senate approved a number of motions proposing changes to academic programs:

• The Faculty of Fine Arts put forward a motion to merge the departments of Music, Theatre and Contemporary Dance to establish a School of Performance. Dean Annie Gérin explained that the change will provide a stronger alignment between “how we teach music, theatre and dance at Concordia and current professional live and performing arts practices”. It will also support the development of an interdisciplinary MFA in Performance Practices that will draw from the combined expertise of the three areas, among other benefits.
• The Faculty of Arts and Science (FAS) proposed reducing the required number of credits of electives outside a student’s field of concentration from 24 to 15. The FAS explained that the “24-credit rule”, now renamed “breadth requirement”, as per its intent, had become increasingly challenging to apply in programs carrying more credits than a regular major or requiring an external accreditation.
• The FAS also put forward a motion to create a new thesis option within the master’s program in Human Systems Intervention, which currently offers only a course-based option. This new option will broaden the applicant pool by attracting candidates who may not wish to become practitioners, the FAS said, and strengthen the field by developing evidence-based research.

Finally, Senators heard a presentation from Volume 10 on the impact of international university students in Quebec.