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Between 1994 and 2007, the Canadian Province of Quebec kept tuition at its public universities stable, access robust, and educational quality high.

In 2007 that tuition freeze was lifted, and a plan to hike tuition $50 a semester, every semester, for five years was implemented. That five-year period expires in 2012, and students are now bracing to oppose a dramatically more punitive tuition scheme. Union university workers, understanding that tuition increases typically go hand-in-hand with budget cuts, are joining them.

Tuition increases ranging from 50% to 135% have been proposed by various parties, as students put officials on notice that they will not accept such actions quietly. Thousands of students protested outside a summit on education funding last week, while tens of thousands more staged a one-day strike. Nearly two dozen student bodies have approved strike plans going forward.

As student activist Adrian Kaats wrote this week, “2011 is going to be one of the most interesting years in Quebec politics … in quite some time,” and students and campus unions are going to be in the thick of it.

I recently visited some of Quebec’s student activists, and came away mightily impressed. — I’ll definitely have much more on this story in the new year. Stay tuned.

The Senate will be holding a crucial procedural vote on the DREAM Act tomorrow (Saturday) morning. Most observers expect it to fail, but the list of who stands where is still pretty murky.

Two Senators — Kay Bailey Hutchison and John McCain — have come out against it in the last couple of weeks, while one supporter — Dick Lugar — wavered briefly before re-affirming his vote. But none of these announcements were at all surprising, and none changed the underlying dynamics of the vote.

I’m not going to try to do a full count just yet, because too much is still in play, but I will use this post to pass along what I know and what I learn over the course of today. Check back in for updates.

• DreamActivist released a new target list this morning, with just eight Senators on it — Democrats Kent Conrad, Mark Pryor, Joe Manchin, and Kay Hagan, and Republicans Sam Brownback George Voinovich, Olympia Snowe, and Susan Collins.

• And speaking of Kent Conrad, he’s a past opponent of the bill, but he gave a surprisingly positive response when asked about it late last week.

• As I noted last night, Democrat Ron Wyden — a solid DREAM Act supporter — was briefly considered a question mark for Saturday’s vote, due to upcoming prostate cancer surgery. But a spokesman has confirmed that though he’ll be away from the Senate for tests today, he will be back and voting tomorrow.

• I noted earlier this month that the White House had said that they expected to need seven Republican votes to pass the bill. No idea what that was based on, or if it’s still operative, but you can see my speculation here.

12:30 pm

• The Daily Kos has a DREAM Act “whip count” post up, but it’s pretty much worthless. It lists nine Republicans who are on record against the bill — LeMieux, Hutchison, Ensign, Kirk, McCain, Kyl, Cornyn, Graham, Gregg — as possible gets, while it portrays Dick Lugar and Bob Bennett, who are on the record as solid supporters of the bill, as question marks. It’s just not based in anything, as far as I can tell.

1:30 pm

• Just got off the phone with a staffer for Senator Snowe, who confirmed that “she’s planning on voting no.” Senator Collins’ staff said she’s still unannounced, and Landrieu’s staff promised to email me with a statement.

1:40 pm

• A staffer for Senator Kay Hagan (D-NC) just confirmed for me that she’ll be voting no on the DREAM Act tomorrow.

• A new post up at the National Review’s “The Corner” blog says that anti-DREAM Act group Numbers USA believes they have 42 votes in opposition to the bill. They claim four Democrats — Mark Pryor, Ben Nelson, Jon Tester, and Hagan — as opposed.

3:00 pm

• I now count 39 38 announced votes against the DREAM Act, and 50 solid votes in favor. With 60 votes needed for passage, that means supporters need to win ten out of the remaining eleven twelve, or flip someone who has already declared against.

• Here are the eleven twelve I see as up in the air: Democrats Kent Conrad, Byron Dorgan, Jon Tester, Max Baucus, Joe Manchin, Claire McCaskill, Mary Landrieu, and Jim Webb, and Republicans Sam Brownback, Susan Collins, and Lisa Murkowski. Edit: George Voinovich should be on this list. Sorry.

• At least two of the Senators on the above list, it should be noted — Jon Tester and Max Baucus — are widely seen as near-certain no votes, though they haven’t announced their plans yet.

Senate majority leader Harry Reid has scheduled votes on the DREAM Act and the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell for this Saturday — apparently defying the White House, which had reportedly been lobbying for the Senate to tackle the START arms control treaty first.

It was announced earlier today that Oregon Democrat Ron Wyden — a crucial vote for both the DREAM Act and DADT repeal — would be missing Senate votes “tomorrow and possibly next week” due to prostate cancer surgery, but his staff clarified this evening that he will be on the Senate floor this weekend. His absence tomorrow is for pre-surgery testing, not the surgery itself, and will not prevent him from casting DREAM and DADT votes Saturday.

DADT repeal looks like a winner Saturday, with 61 Senators pledged to vote for cloture — one more than the 60 needed. The DREAM Act faces a much tougher road, but is by no means doomed to fail.

Friday Update | Lots of news out this morning, including new announcements from several Senators on how they’ll vote. Read it all here.

Last week the Orange County DA brought charges against nineteen participants in a sit-in at the University of California at Irvine.

The sit-in was last February. The charges were brought during finals week.

That’s right. The district attorney waited a total of 288 days to bring the charges, then brought them in the middle of finals. And set appearance dates during winter break.

This week a DA in San Francisco pulled a similar stunt, surprising several students who had been arrested at November’s protest at the UC Regents meeting with unannounced battery charges. Two of the students wound up having to post high bail. And yes, finals week at Berkeley was this week.

It’s the first parliamentary election since Britain’s governing coalition announced its plans for huge tuition fee increases and higher education budget cuts. It’s being held in a district with a university campus. And it’s scheduled for Christmas break.

The UK’s Liberal Democrats are the junior partners in the new British government, but they’re taking most of the student heat over the fee increases — they ran on a platform of eliminating tuition fees entirely, and won a high level of student support. (Many Lib Dem candidates, including the party’s leader, signed pledges not to vote to raise fees under any circumstances.)

So this local election in the district of Oldham East and Saddleworth, prompted by a vacancy in the seat, represents a big test for the party. In May, the Labour party candidate won by a 103 vote margin out of a total of 44,520 cast. The University of Huddersfield has a satellite campus in Oldham that enrolls 1200 students, so that constituency could easily swing the election.

Which is why the election is being held on January 13, before those students come back from break.

Fun Fact: The Chancellor of the University of Huddersfield is Captain Picard. Really.