Canada's Systems of Education

Published on 2022-09-22; updated on 2023-06-22

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The systems

Each province and territory in Canada has exclusive responsibility for elementary, secondary, and post-secondary education within its borders. The national government does not administer education in Canada, instead The Council of Ministers of Education, Canada (CMEC) is founded in 1967 by ministers of education to serve as an intergovernmental body.

The basic structures of the education systems across Canada are similar: each system in every province/territory has three tiers—elementary, secondary, and post-secondary. However, there are notable differences between provinces/territories:

• The grades at which each level begins and ends vary according to province/territory;
• Education is compulsory to the age of 15, 16, or 18, depending on the jurisdiction.

The graphic below shows which educational pathways are available to students in various regions of Canada.

Pathways to degrees in law or medicine are different from those in China. To progress to programs for degrees in law or medicine, the students are required to have had some level of prior undergraduate study with admission contingent on high enough grades and/or other program-specific criteria.

Flexibility of post-secondary study

There is a great deal of flexibility within the Canadian post-secondary system, with colleges, polytechnics, and universities increasingly cooperating to give students the exact education they need for their chosen careers. Students can compose their own education, for example:

• They could choose to take a full degree from one institution (college, polytechnic, or university). This is a tradional pathway.
• They could choose to start their degree at one institution and then finish it at another, since there are a lot of university transfer programs.
• They could complete a full degree at one institution then add on to it with a diploma or certificate from another institution designed to give them more specific and/or practical skills.
• They could choose to take a diploma or certificate (or several, depending on the skills they wanted and requirements of their desired job) rather than a degree.

Quick facts

• Approximately 95% of Canadian students attend public schools (K-12) in Canada. About 5% students are sent to private and independent schools.
• Each year, more than 40,000 international students choose to study in public and private schools (K-12) in Canada.
• Close to 15,000 undergraduate and graduate degree programs are offered by roughly 100 institutions nationwide.
• 500,000 students graduate from Canada’s colleges and universities each year.
• The proportion of Canadians aged 25 to 64 with a post-secondary degree or diploma is 54%, the highest in the OECD.
• Canada is now in fourth place globally as a receiver of post-secondary international students after the US, UK, and China (surpassing Australia and France).

The Advantages of Studying in Canada

• High Quality
  • Canada is among the leaders in the G8 in terms of its per capita investment in education, leading to high-quality and well-respected faculty, programs, and institutions.
  • Each Canadian province and territory has its own quality assurance mechanisms to ensure high educational standards are met, and there are robust laws, policies, and procedures that govern the operation of all K-12 and post-secondary institutions. Each province also offers students the ability to study in English, in French, or in both.
  • Canadian students are consistently ranked among the top academic performers in reading, math, and science according to ongoing The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the OECD's Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) research.
  • The Times Higher Education's 2018–2019 World University Rankings placed nine Canadian universities in the top 200 (four were in the top 100 and 20 were in the top 500). As well, Shanghai Jiao Tong University’s 2018 Academic Ranking of World Universities placed four Canadian institutions in its top 100.
• Practical Students gain practical skills and hands-on training and generally have easy access to professors.
• Flexibility Canada has an excellent reputation for transfers between levels/types of education, making studying here flexible and exciting—students don’t run into the bureaucratic roadblocks common in less flexible education systems.
• Opportunities to work and to attain permanent residence Canada is known for its laws allowing eligible students to work in Canada while studying and after graduation, and for providing opportunities for eligible graduates to attain permanent residence.

Web resources

A prospective international student or an educational agent will need to have contacts/information specific to the provincial education system rather than at the national level. Some web links about the provincial education system in Canada are:

• The EduCanada website.

• The Council of Ministers of Education, Canada (CMEC) s an intergovernmental body founded in 1967 by ministers of education.

• The Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada list of designated learning institutions that qualify to enrol international students.

• The Canadian Information Centre for International Credentials’ (CICIC’s) listing of Ministries/Departments Responsible for Education in Canada as well as its Credential Evaluation, Assessment, and Qualification Assessment Services page.

• The Canadian Association for Public Schools—International (CAPS-I): This organization’s website provides information about which public schools (elementary/secondary, also known as K-12 which is short for Kindergarten to Grade 12) in Canada provide education to international students.

• The Canadian Accredited Independent Schools (CAIS): This website provides information about which Canadian K-12 schools outside of the public school system (i.e., private or “independent”) provide education to international students.

• Universities Canada: This organization’s website provides information about which Canadian universities provide education to international students.

• Colleges and Institutes Canada (CICan): This organization’s website provides information about which Canadian colleges, cégeps, institutes, and polytechnics provide education to international students.

• Languages Canada (LC): This organization’s website provides information about which accredited Canadian languages schools provide education for international students