A student's PPR (Passport Request / final approval) came through only days before their college's registration deadline, with too little time to book travel or know how long stamping would take. They asked whether starting online, deferring to the next intake, or another option was best.
What the thread advised:- Starting the term online generally does not affect PGWP eligibility, as long as it's a temporary, unavoidable delay tied to visa processing — this was the reassurance given for the immediate deadline problem.
- Check your specific college's online-to-in-person switching rules before committing — one member's experience (Sheridan) was that once you start a semester online, you must finish that entire semester online; you can't switch to in-person partway through even after arriving in Canada. Rules differ by school, so confirm with your own institution.
- Talk to your professor/department about a partial-term accommodation — one student got permission to attend online for a set period (e.g., one month) before transitioning to in-person, which shows some flexibility can be negotiated case by case.
Bottom line: starting online due to a late PPR is a workable stopgap, but the flexibility to later switch to in-person mid-semester depends entirely on your specific college's policy — confirm this before you decide.