If you missed our latest Lunch & Learn on February 29th, it was a huge success! Right off the bat, our virtual space filled up with chatter amongst familiar faces and as one participant delightfully noted, there was “so much love in the room”. How exciting it was to welcome 69 professionals from all across Southern Alberta with such thoughtful remarks and questions! It is safe to say that we all walked away with some newfound knowledge and a strengthened sense of community.
Our speakers, Megan Gill, BSW, RSW, and Radhika Menon, BSW, M. Comm presented “A Primer on Immigration, Refugee, and Settlement Processes”. Both alumni of the University of Calgary’s Faculty of Social Work, Megan and Radhika are working as MITACS research interns at the Newcomer Knowledge Hub (K-Hub). If you are curious about K-Hub, sign up here to stay in the loop with all our updates!
Before we dove in, we took a moment to acknowledge the land on which we reside – we thanked the signatory Nations of Treaty 7 which includes the Siksika, the Piikani, the Kainai, the Tsuut’ina and the Stoney Nakoda. And for this session, we especially emphasized our country’s complex narrative, as both a sanctuary for newcomers seeking to build a new life and a place marked by colonization that continues to impact Indigenous communities adversely. Indeed, the history of Canadian immigration is rooted in the desire to claim and own land, extract resources, and culturally assimilate the stewards who have cared for these lands since time immemorial.
Immigration and Colonial History
It all begins in the 1600s with the arrival of the first Europeans in Eastern Canada. This era saw the establishment of French and British colonies, which paved the way for the Scottish soldiers, as well as the German, Swedish, and Irish settlers, followed by the Loyalists after the Civil War. Migration extended to Western Canada in the late 1800s, when John A. Macdonald introduced the Homestead Grant to populate the West by offering free land to White European farmers.
The Métis Scrip and the Residential School system, instituted in the late 1800s, represent a dark chapter of cultural genocide against Indigenous peoples (Please also see The Final Report of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls, Volumes 1a and 1b). Further imposition of ethnically biased immigration policies such as the Chinese Head Tax, anti-Black Medical Act, refusal of Jewish WWII refugees, and Japanese Detention Camps worked to maintain Canada’s demographic as predominantly White. The racialized minority began to speak out against these racist legislations and by 1971, the majority of the immigrant population in Canada became of non-European ancestry.
Today, around 20% of the Canadian population is born outside of Canada, and we plan to welcome an average of 500,000 newcomers per year, starting in 2025. The breakdown looks like this: 60% of this population would arrive as economic immigrants, 25% through the family reunification system, and 15% as refugees. These immigration targets are established by the Government of Canada annually and are further refined with provincial, territorial, and organizational inputs.
Immigration Today
Did you know that there are at least 19 different ways for newcomers to enter Canada? We explored nine immigration, seven refugee protection, and three temporary status programs, each with its own unique eligibility criteria, assessment procedures, funding mechanisms, and sponsorship obligations. While most of us in the settlement sector are familiar with various programs, such as Government-Assisted Refugees (GAR), Rainbow Refugee Assistance Partnership (RRAP), or Canada-Ukraine Authorization for Emergency Travel (CUAET), Radhika’s comprehensive overview of each category was incredibly useful in understanding the current immigration ecosystem.
We also had the chance to utilize this new knowledge by navigating through a complex case study, where we identified the steps involved in securing legal status, legal assistance, accommodation, and employment for a newcomer client. As we wrapped up our session, we discussed the challenges that newcomers face in Canada, such as lack of information on resources, inadequate recognition of foreign credentials, insufficient proficiency in the official language, discrimination, and overall diminished health and well-being, among others. We paused to think about other challenges that we have encountered in our work with newcomers and, for a few of us in the room, in our personal immigration journey.
The Lunch & Learn series is a monthly virtual gathering hosted by the Newcomer Knowledge Hub. We provide informative presentations delivered by experts in the settlement sector. Whether you are a service provider, policymaker, student, or simply curious about the world of settlement, we invite you to join us at our next session. Click here to become a part of our Southern Albertan network of passionate professionals!
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