Salaries at the top of Ontario’s struggling colleges remained steady last year, according to the Sunshine List, after another bruising 12 months of layoffs and restructuring ended with a potential tuition fee hike and sweeping changes to student loans.

The province’s 24 publicly funded colleges have struggled significantly ever since a federal cap on the number of international students, which made up roughly a third of their revenue, was introduced at the beginning of 2024.

Figures released through mediation last summer estimated some 8,000 staff had been laid off across the sector, with more than 600 programs cut. More colleges have announced voluntary and involuntary layoffs since then.

Despite the thousands of staff who have been shown the door, compensation at the very top of Ontario’s colleges has remained close to half a million dollars for the top five presidents in the province.

Data released through Ontario’s annual salary disclosure, known as the Sunshine List, shows the average pay for presidents of Conestoga, Fleming, Humber, Seneca and Mohawk colleges in 2025 was roughly $507,000 — up around three per cent from the year before.

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John Tibbits, the recently departed president of Conestoga College, topped the list with $601,684 in pay last year. That’s down from the $636,106.70 he earned in 2024, but still substantially higher than $494,716.07 in 2023.

Maureen Adamson of Fleming College earned the second-highest salary of any college president at $512,428. She also recently left her role at the top of the college — her pay jumping 43 per cent in her final year of service.

Humber College’s president pulled in around $497,000 in 2025, while the head of Seneca earned just over $476,000. The president of Mohawk College made $445,166.97 in 2025, the lowest paid of the top five.

Three of the top five presidents also received five-figure taxable benefits, which can include perks like a car allowance, along with their salaries. David Agnew, president of Seneca, had taxable benefits worth $18,094.64

At least four of the five of the colleges run by the highest paid presidents laid off staff in the past 12 months.

Conestoga has been hit with repeated layoffs, including some 400 notices the union said were given to staff in December. Fleming College also announced a round of layoffs expected to impact dozens of staff members in the summer, while Humber College recently announced layoffs after voluntary exits failed to reduce its headcount sufficiently.

Mohawk College laid off tens of staff in a recent round of cuts.

Global News approached all five colleges on Friday; only Humber College responded ahead of publication.

“Executive compensation at Humber, including the President’s salary, is set by the Board of Governors through a transparent process that benchmarks against comparable institutions. These decisions are made independently of day-to-day operational decisions and follow sector standards for accountability and governance,” a spokesperson wrote.

“Like other Ontario institutions, Humber is impacted by the extraordinary budgetary and financial pressures facing the post-secondary sector overall.”

Colleges Ontario also did not respond to a request for comment.

The Sunshine List was first introduced in 1996, with the promise of making it easier for taxpayers to see where some of their money is being spent.

The annual list takes into account total compensation, including overtime or severance payments.

According to the Bank of Canada’s inflation calculator, $100,000 from 1996, when the Sunshine List was launched, is worth north of  $185,017.03 in 2024. About 22,530 names on the list are over that inflationary threshold.

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Premier Doug Ford’s office grew in size and salaries in 2025, according to the latest edition of the Sunshine List, which shows 50 top employees earned a combined $8.1 million last year.

On Friday, Ontario released its list of annual salary disclosures, revealing that more than 400,000 publicly paid employees in the province earned over $100,000 last year.

The list shows 50 individuals in the premier’s office, from Ford’s executive assistant to his chief of staff, who earned an average of $162,000 in 2025. Those salaries pushed total compensation to over $8 million for the first time in provincial history.

The sunshine list salaries in the premier’s office also grew by 10.9 per cent compared to 2024, well above the average rate of inflation of 2.1 per cent in 2025.

The number of staff who made the Sunshine List also grew by 6.4 per cent from 2024.

NDP Leader Marit Stiles slammed the premier for having “the biggest, most expensive cabinet and office in Ontario history.”

“Everyday Ontarians aren’t getting 10 percent salary increases. If they’re lucky enough to even be working during this Premier’s jobs disaster, they’re juggling multiple jobs to make ends meet or struggling to afford their rent and their groceries,” Stiles said in a statement.

“When he got elected, Ford promised Ontarians that the party with taxpayer dollars was over, turns out, he was just getting started.”

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The Ontario Liberals said the amount demonstrates a lack of financial discipline, especially given the $13.8 billion deficit the Ford government revealed in its 2026 budget.

“Doug Ford’s Conservatives talk about fiscal prudence and transparency, that’s not how the Premier runs his own office,” said Liberal Finance Critic Stephanie Bowman.

“While the President of the Treasury Board brags about a hiring freeze, they have expanded the Premier’s Office. They are wasting money during an affordability crisis.”

While a spokesperson for the premier’s office, who also appeared on the Sunshine List, did not respond to a request for comment, a government minister recently laid out the justification for high salaries in Ford’s office.

In November, during a financial estimates committee hearing at Queen’s Park, Ontario’s Minister of Red Tape Reduction, Andrea Khanjin, defended the growing spending.

“Given the amount of work that’s being done in light of the unprecedented economic time, you’re going to want really good, high-quality staff and for them to be compensated accordingly,” Khanjin said. “These are individuals who do not work 9-5, they are not unionized, and so we rely on them to do the heavy lifting.”

Khanjin also said staff are paid to “work at a moment’s notice.”

“Whether there is an imminent economic meeting that’s happening between the Premier and a governor or the Premier and the Prime Minister. The work that’s laid out by these individuals is 24/7 type of work,” she added.

The growth — which has been steady since Ford took office in 2019 –- also eclipses what former Premier Kathleen Wynne spent on her office.

In 2019, the Progressive Conservatives’ first full year in office, 20 employees made the Sunshine List in the premier’s office, costing taxpayers $2.9 million in total compensation.

By 2023, the number of Ford’s direct employees on the Sunshine List more than doubled to 48, with a combined compensation of $6.9 million.

In 2017, Wynne’s last full year in office, 18 people working in the premier’s office made the Sunshine List, with a combined pay of $2.8 million, compared with the $8.1 million paid out by Ford in 2025.

Critics have also suggested that the government is hiding the true cost of the premier’s office salaries.

In the government’s 2025 spending estimates, the province set aside just $2 million for salaries and wages in the Premier’s Office – 75 per cent lower than what was reported in the Sunshine List.

At the time, the government reported a complement of 72 staff.

The NDP and Liberals have highlighted the discrepancy.

“Government books show the Premier’s Office has cost $2,326,800 since 2019. The sunshine list tells a different story — about $8.1 million this year alone, while staffing has tripled since Ford became Premier,” Bowman said.

“I have repeatedly asked the Minister of Finance and the President of the Treasury Board to disclose the true cost of staffing the Premier’s Office. They have refused every time.”

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