CASA has been advocating for students since the 1990s, and here is a selection of what CASA has accomplished prior to 2020.

CASA continues to work to protect the advocacy wins students have won in the past, and get new ones for the future. Budgets in 2023 and 2024 gave us a wide range of funding investments, some preserving old CASA wins, and some representing new funding.

These aren't all of our accomplishments, CASA student leaders are also the driving force behind other impactful policies, like improving the quality of programs, lowering costs of housing, or non-spending changes like "grandfathering" post-graduate work permit eligibility for those already in Canada when international student caps were announced.

Our advocacy to each of these recommendations takes place through gathering research and presenting to government, lobbying elected officials, and informing public opinion. Here is a summary of the work that was done in the lead up to some of these wins. 

Mental Health

$500 million in youth mental health funding through 2026-27

In Budget 2024, the Government of Canada invested $500 million in youth mental health over five years, including eligibility for post-secondary students. CASA was there, from running a mental health campaign in 2019, giving government polling data from students in 2020, and after youth mental health inclusion in the 2021 Liberal platform, placing mental health as a CASA priority in 2022 and 2023, pushing the government to follow through in its commitment. 

Canada Student Grants & Loans

$1.1 billion in student assistance to those who could not otherwise afford it

The Canada Student Financial Assistance program gives grants and loans to students based on income and disability status. The program has a "permanent" level, which sets a maximum of $3000 a year in grants and $7140 in loans over an expected 8 months of study per year.

During the onset of COVID-19, CASA pushed the government to honour a 2019 election pledge to increase these maximums. The government responded by going above even their election pledge as a temporary level, without changing the permanent level, and has renewed a commitment to $4200 and $10200 grant and loan maximums since 2023. But these are precarious, and expire automatically if not renewed. CASA has successfully advocated for renewals of these levels in 2023, 2024, while pushing for amounts to be made permanent through campaigns in 2023 and 2024.

2025 was the most recent renewal in which CASA was namedropped, at an estimated disbursement of $1.1 billion compared to the temporary level.

Eliminating loan interest

In 2018-2019, CASA began advocacy on creating a 6-month interest-free period on federal student loans, which the government implemented in 2019. In the 2022-2023 advocacy year, CASA advocated for lowered interest on debt, saying the government should move towards zero-interest federal loans. The government implemented this in the fall of 2022. 

Graduate Student Funding

In 2022-2023 and 2023-2024, CASA advocated for retroactive increases for inflation to Canada Graduate Scholarships and Postdoctoral Fellowship programs, which directly support approximately 3% of graduate students, and indirectly supports the entire graduate funding ecosystem. In 2023-2024, CASA became a founding member of the Coalition for Canadian Research, a group of organizations pushing for increased federal science funding. By joining, CASA, universities and other groups such as Support Our Science pushed for increases for both direct student funding and Tri-Council funding, which supports professors and pays their research assistants. After a campaign, joint press conference with MPs calling for action, and a CASA appearance before the House Standing Committee on Science and Research, the government announced the permanent increase in Budget 2024, along with increases in general Tri-Council funding. In line with CASA recommendations, the award value for Canada Graduate Scholarships increased, and also moved to directly supporting approximately 7% of graduate students. 

Student Employment

Canada Summer Jobs

In 2017 and 2018, CASA asked the government to increase the level of Canada Summer Job positions from 70,000 in 2017 to 110,000 in 2018. While the government did not take action in 2019, in 2020, CASA called upon the government to redirect other funding to the Canada Summer Jobs program, providing 124,000 Canada Summer jobs in 2021. As spending during pandemic receded, Canada Summer Jobs numbers went back to around 70,000, and in March 2025, CASA called on the government to increase spots by 10,000 for the upcoming summer, and the government did deliver 6,000 additional positions in June. 

Student Work Placement Program

CASA has recently provided as much, if not more, student employment energy towards the Student Work Placement program, which is exclusively for post-secondary students and is designed to match up with people requiring a co-op or placement in addition to non-coop students, something that shorter Canada Summer Jobs might not do as well. In CASA's 2025 Learning & Earning report, CASA reiterated its 2024 priority of expanding the program, and the Minister of Jobs and Families has used our report for background material. This led to a 2025 expansion of the expiring program for another year as one of the government's last priorities before the 2025 election.

Indigenous Student Priorities

Indigenous students in Canada often face increased travel costs, and many may have exceptional need that isn't fully covered by Canada Student Grants. To overcome continuing underrepresentation of Indigenous students specifically at the university level, CASA has advocated for increases to the Post-Secondary Student Support Program for First Nations students, and similar programs for Métis and Inuit students. The pool of money for these programs has not grown fast enough to accomadate all those Indigenous students who are able to attend post-secondary, and these shortfalls cause distributing authorities like band councils to have to make tough decisions on who gets funded. CASA advocated in 2016-2017 to expand funding, leading to 3 years of expanded funding between 2018 and 2020.

The National Indigenous Advocacy Committee at CASA was founded in 2020, and in 2022, CASA once again argued for more funding for the programs, stating that current funding levels were inadequate. In 2023-2024, this was one of CASA's top 6 priorities, as the existing elevated funding was expiring. Budget 2024 extended the elevated funding at approximately the same rate, and CASA continues to advocate in support of the National Indigenous Advocacy Committee's identified priorities.

International Student Advocacy

International students are widespread in Canada, and an important part of CASA's advocacy, both past and present. While major changes in 2024 changed many conditions for international students, CASA was active in trying to ensure that any changes were grandfathered in.

CASA continues to be involved in consultations around international students, appearing before the committee in December 2024 to present on our recommendations that we submitted earlier that year.