This article originally appeared in the Financial Post. Below is an excerpt from the article.
By Jack Mintz, April 24, 2026
Current federal “diversity, equity and inclusion” (or DEI) criteria for post-secondary research funding are anathema to high-quality university education. If the provinces that regulate and largely finance universities are to fulfill their educational responsibilities, they must put a stop to it.
Under the federal DEI criteria for prestigious Canada Research Chair (CRC) applications, “all institutions that accept agency funding must make concerted efforts to meet their equity and diversity targets and provide a supportive and inclusive workplace.” Equity targets for 2029 are 50.9 per cent for gender, 22 per cent for “racialized minorities,” 7.5 per for cent disabled candidates and 4.9 per cent for Indigenous — though some candidates may fall into more than one category. The message is clear: white males need not apply.
When Ottawa’s granting councils secretariat put Memorial University on a “consequence” list, withholding its CRC grants for failing to reach its equity targets, Memorial faced a hard choice: either take federal money by complying with Ottawa’s equity targets or maintain merit-based hiring but forgo the funding.
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Jack Mintz is the President’s Fellow at the University of Calgary’s school of public policy and a distinguished fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute.
