New Website to Help Jobseekers and Students

Canada’s unemployment has been slow to go down after the recession, but what is surprising, or perhaps not surprising, is that many employers say they are struggling without qualified personnel.

So, the Canadian government has come up with a new website. Running under workingincanada.gc.ca, the website is a treasure trove for those seeking jobs and for employers.

The main search function can be used by Job Title, Skills Set possessed or Qualification.

Perhaps one of the most important segments of the new website is the Jobs Outlook segment. It is not yet complete, but once it is, the segment will yield sectors for which there will be demand, or not, in the coming years.

The federal government says one key reason for this website is resolve what it, and some of the major employers of Canada, calls a skills crisis.

It says that there is already a shortage of experienced people in the health care, information technology and skilled trades. For example, some reports say there will be a shortage of as many as 60,000 nurses throughout the country in ten years time.

What is interesting is that while unemployment remains high in many developed countries, policy makers in these countries also say there is a shortage of skilled personnel, and this will get only worse in the coming years.

Language Proficiency Rule to be Changed

OCTOBER 15, 2011

The Canadian government wants to change the way language proficiency is tested for those who apply to become citizens.

In a gazette Notice of Intent issued, Citizenship and Immigration Canada – the federal department in charge of immigration issues – says that in future it would like applicants to prove their proficiency in either of the two official languages – English and French – when they submit their citizenship application.

At present, language proficiency is tested during the citizenship application process. It is tested through the 20 multiple choice questions. If the applicant fails the test, then he or she has to appear before a citizenship judge to answer questions.

How to Prove Proficiency

But under the new proposals, applicants will have to prove, upfront, their fluency through one of the following three methods:

• The results of a third party test
• Evidence of completion of secondary or post-secondary education in English or French, or
• Evidence of achieving the Canadian Language Benchmark (CLB) or Niveaux de compétence linguistique canadiens level 4 (both these organizations set Canadian standards for language proficiency).

The CIC says that this is not an increase in the level of language proficiency, but rather change the way language proficiency for applicants between the ages of 18 to 54 is assessed.

The change has not become a rule, and the CIC wants public input. Those interested in expressing their views can do so within the next 30 days by accessing the contact information through this site.

The CIC has already made proficiency proof through written exams mandatory for those wanting to apply to immigrate to Canada.

What’s in a name? A job, maybe

TAVIA GRANT

Globe and Mail Blog

Posted on Friday, October 14, 2011 10:49AM EDT

Job seekers with common anglophone names such as Greg Brown on their résumés get more responses from employers in Canada’s three largest cities than applicants with foreign-sounding names – regardless of work experience, education or language proficiency, new research shows.

According to University of Toronto researchers Philip Oreopoulos and Diane Dechief, applications submitted by people with English-sounding names are 47 per cent more likely to receive callbacks than those with Indian or Chinese ones in Toronto, 39 per cent more likely in Montreal, and 20 per cent more likely in Vancouver.

The findings to be released Friday are consistent with Mr. Oreopoulos’s 2009 research, which focused strictly on employers in the Toronto area.

His follow-up research explores why employers seem to discriminate against job applicants with foreign-sounding names. The researchers sent out close to 8,000 randomly created résumés for various job postings in the three cities between February and September of last year. The jobs required at least a bachelor’s degree and four to six years of work experience. Some of the CVs had anglophone names such as Jill Smith, while others had Greek, Indian or Chinese names such as Lukas Minsopoulos, and Yong Zhang.

The researchers found that people with Greek, Chinese and Indian names are less likely to hear back from employers. “Even for applicants with Canadian education and Canadian experience ... the result is concerning that there this a difference that’s generated from a name,” Mr. Oreopoulos said.

The second part of the research asked HR professionals why they think people with foreign-sounding names are less likely to be contacted for an interview. The HR people typically cited concern over language or social skills – a response that contradicts the fact that many résumés clearly cited Canadian experience and fluency in English and French.

“Subconscious” discrimination may explain why immigrants with foreign-sounding names get lower callback rates, Mr. Oreopoulos said.

The study comes amid a persistent gap between immigrant and Canadian-born employment rates and wages. The jobless rate for Canadian-born workers was 5.4 per cent last month, compared to 8.3 per cent for all immigrants and 13.4 per cent for recent immigrants, according to the Toronto Immigrant Employment Data Initiative. Wages of recent immigrants are about 49 per cent lower than native-born workers, census data show – even though immigrants typically have higher rates of education.

The authors cite several solutions to the problem. One is to train recruiters to be more aware of possible bias, and to consider better ways of discerning foreign-language ability.

The project was co-funded by Metropolis British Columbia and Human Resources and Skills Development Canada.

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