Tens of thousands of temporary residents who came to Canada as international students might be forced to return to their home countries in the next year – the result of a recent series of immigration policy changes that has left them with no prospect of obtaining permanent residency.
Policy experts estimate that between 70,000 and 130,000 international students holding postgraduation work permits (PGWP) will see their visas expiring in 2024 and 2025. Most, they predict, will not receive visa extensions or an invitation to apply for permanent residency because of Ottawa’s shifting approach to immigration that is aiming to cap the number of temporary residents and low-wage foreign workers in the country.
Cyclists pass by a protest-encampment on the side of a busy road in Brampton. The group of workers, international students and community members are calling for longer post-graduate work permits for international students and better pathways to permanent residency.Sammy Kogan/The Globe and Mail
“There is a lot of panic amongst people who have now been here for years studying and working and paying their taxes,” said Vasanthi Venkatesh, a law professor at the University of Windsor, whose area of expertise includes immigration and citizenship law. “They came to this country through student programs that were arguably presented by policy makers as a path to permanent residency. Now you have rule changes coming out in piecemeal fashion every few weeks and that has a real effect on people who are already here.”
Postgraduation work permits are issued for between nine months to three years to foreign students who have obtained a diploma or degree at a Canadian college or university.
By the end of 2023, there were 396,235 PGWP holders across the country, almost triple the number from 2018.
That same year, a series of policy reversals and changes began to take place. Ottawa stopped granting extensions to PGWPs and noted that granting permanent residency to temporary residents in bulk was a one-time emergency pandemic measure. The government also abruptly changed its criteria for permanent resident (PR) selection in the Express Entry system – a score-based application process that determines eligibility for permanent residency. It began prioritizing French speakers and people with job experience in health care, skilled trades, agriculture, transportation and STEM – science, technology, engineering and mathematics – fields as opposed to those with Canadian-specific education and experience.
“Nobody knows the probability of a successful permanent residency transition now because the PR selection system has become highly non-transparent and unpredictable,” explained Mikal Skuterud, an economist at the University of Waterloo. “What we do know is that the government is not going to grant extensions to expiring visas so there will now be many, many people in situations where they either remain in Canada undocumented or leave.”
There is no precise data that reflect exactly how many foreign graduates currently holding PGWPs will see their visas expire this year. The Naujawan Support Network – a labour advocacy organization based in Brampton, Ont. – estimates that approximately 70,000 PGWP holders will not obtain permanent residency before their visas expire and be forced to leave Canada in 2024 and 2025.
Prof. Skuterud estimates that approximately 131,000 permits could expire this year – if one were to assume that most PGWPs issued had three-year durations. But he noted that an exact figure was tough to determine.
Sarabjit Singh has been sleeping on and off inside these tents for the better part of this week, coming before and after his shifts as a CNC machinist. After coming to Canada as an international student, he was able to find full time work in his field directly out of school. Singh worries about keeping his job as his temporary permit to stay in Canada expires at the end of this month – with no guarantee of renewal.
Mehakdeep Singh, an international student on a PGWP, is in a similar boat. He arrived in Canada from India in 2018 and studied to be an HVAC technician at Fleming College in Peterborough just to increase his chances of obtaining permanent residency.
After Mehakdeep Singh came to Canada as an international student in 2018, he struggled to find work in his industry after completing a HVAC repair program. Singh worked as a security guard throughout COVID-19, but is currently out of a job after his temporary work permit expired this year.Sammy Kogan/The Globe and Mail
He got a job as a supervisor for a security company, but soon found that he had no chance of obtaining permanent residency through the Canadian Experience Class because draws were paused. He changed fields, working as a baker in North Bay, Ont., with the hopes of using another immigration stream – the provincial nominee program. He’s still waiting for a response, but his PGWP expired in July, and he is now on a visitor visa. After living in Canada for six years, his only option at this point is to re-enter the country through the temporary foreign worker program.
Both Sarabjit and Mehakdeep are part of a growing number of workers and students on expiring work permits campaigning for Ottawa to grant them an extension to their visas and a “fair pathway” to permanent residency – specifically, a guarantee that draws from all streams of the Express Entry system will be conducted regularly. They have set up a protest site in Brampton and intend on staying there until the government acknowledges their situation.
Ottawa also recently shuttered a temporary program that allowed people on visitor visas to apply for a work permit from within Canada citing the involvement of bad actors. According to Mr. Gill, some PGWP holders were advised to use the program to apply for visitor status just to extend their ability to remain in Canada.
“Each of these paths is presented to these students as a way to maintain status and continue working. But each path will lead most people to a dead end eventually and expose them to greater debt and exploitation along the way,” he said.
Prof. Skuterud said he understood the frustration faced by PGWP holders because they planned their migration and uprooted their lives when immigration rules were vastly different. “Many of them might remain here without status, in the hopes that they will eventually get status,” he said.
In January, Ottawa announced a two-year cap on international students and said it would stop issuing PGWPs to international students who complete programs at schools operating under a public-private partnership model. That permit was a key draw for students to attend private colleges that team up with public colleges through curriculum licensing agreements.
Source: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/bus...rnational-students-who-spent-years-finding-a/ (The Globe and Mail)
මේක ගැන තියෙන වෙනත් වීඩියෝ වලින් කීපයක් :
Policy experts estimate that between 70,000 and 130,000 international students holding postgraduation work permits (PGWP) will see their visas expiring in 2024 and 2025. Most, they predict, will not receive visa extensions or an invitation to apply for permanent residency because of Ottawa’s shifting approach to immigration that is aiming to cap the number of temporary residents and low-wage foreign workers in the country.
Cyclists pass by a protest-encampment on the side of a busy road in Brampton. The group of workers, international students and community members are calling for longer post-graduate work permits for international students and better pathways to permanent residency.Sammy Kogan/The Globe and Mail
“There is a lot of panic amongst people who have now been here for years studying and working and paying their taxes,” said Vasanthi Venkatesh, a law professor at the University of Windsor, whose area of expertise includes immigration and citizenship law. “They came to this country through student programs that were arguably presented by policy makers as a path to permanent residency. Now you have rule changes coming out in piecemeal fashion every few weeks and that has a real effect on people who are already here.”
Postgraduation work permits are issued for between nine months to three years to foreign students who have obtained a diploma or degree at a Canadian college or university.
Under the Liberals, the number of PGWPs issued began to soar rapidly – incentivizing international students to work and remain in Canada was, in fact, part of a deliberate policy to address the country’s waning population growth and pandemic-related labour shortage. At the height of the pandemic in 2021, Ottawa swiftly granted permanent residency to 90,000 temporary workers and international students on postgraduation work permits. That same year, the government introduced a measure that allowed people with expiring PGWPs to apply for an 18-month extension.
By the end of 2023, there were 396,235 PGWP holders across the country, almost triple the number from 2018.
That same year, a series of policy reversals and changes began to take place. Ottawa stopped granting extensions to PGWPs and noted that granting permanent residency to temporary residents in bulk was a one-time emergency pandemic measure. The government also abruptly changed its criteria for permanent resident (PR) selection in the Express Entry system – a score-based application process that determines eligibility for permanent residency. It began prioritizing French speakers and people with job experience in health care, skilled trades, agriculture, transportation and STEM – science, technology, engineering and mathematics – fields as opposed to those with Canadian-specific education and experience.
“Nobody knows the probability of a successful permanent residency transition now because the PR selection system has become highly non-transparent and unpredictable,” explained Mikal Skuterud, an economist at the University of Waterloo. “What we do know is that the government is not going to grant extensions to expiring visas so there will now be many, many people in situations where they either remain in Canada undocumented or leave.”
There is no precise data that reflect exactly how many foreign graduates currently holding PGWPs will see their visas expire this year. The Naujawan Support Network – a labour advocacy organization based in Brampton, Ont. – estimates that approximately 70,000 PGWP holders will not obtain permanent residency before their visas expire and be forced to leave Canada in 2024 and 2025.
Prof. Skuterud estimates that approximately 131,000 permits could expire this year – if one were to assume that most PGWPs issued had three-year durations. But he noted that an exact figure was tough to determine.
Sarabjit Singh has been sleeping on and off inside these tents for the better part of this week, coming before and after his shifts as a CNC machinist. After coming to Canada as an international student, he was able to find full time work in his field directly out of school. Singh worries about keeping his job as his temporary permit to stay in Canada expires at the end of this month – with no guarantee of renewal.
Mehakdeep Singh, an international student on a PGWP, is in a similar boat. He arrived in Canada from India in 2018 and studied to be an HVAC technician at Fleming College in Peterborough just to increase his chances of obtaining permanent residency.
After Mehakdeep Singh came to Canada as an international student in 2018, he struggled to find work in his industry after completing a HVAC repair program. Singh worked as a security guard throughout COVID-19, but is currently out of a job after his temporary work permit expired this year.Sammy Kogan/The Globe and Mail
He got a job as a supervisor for a security company, but soon found that he had no chance of obtaining permanent residency through the Canadian Experience Class because draws were paused. He changed fields, working as a baker in North Bay, Ont., with the hopes of using another immigration stream – the provincial nominee program. He’s still waiting for a response, but his PGWP expired in July, and he is now on a visitor visa. After living in Canada for six years, his only option at this point is to re-enter the country through the temporary foreign worker program.
Both Sarabjit and Mehakdeep are part of a growing number of workers and students on expiring work permits campaigning for Ottawa to grant them an extension to their visas and a “fair pathway” to permanent residency – specifically, a guarantee that draws from all streams of the Express Entry system will be conducted regularly. They have set up a protest site in Brampton and intend on staying there until the government acknowledges their situation.
Ottawa also recently shuttered a temporary program that allowed people on visitor visas to apply for a work permit from within Canada citing the involvement of bad actors. According to Mr. Gill, some PGWP holders were advised to use the program to apply for visitor status just to extend their ability to remain in Canada.
“Each of these paths is presented to these students as a way to maintain status and continue working. But each path will lead most people to a dead end eventually and expose them to greater debt and exploitation along the way,” he said.
Prof. Skuterud said he understood the frustration faced by PGWP holders because they planned their migration and uprooted their lives when immigration rules were vastly different. “Many of them might remain here without status, in the hopes that they will eventually get status,” he said.
In January, Ottawa announced a two-year cap on international students and said it would stop issuing PGWPs to international students who complete programs at schools operating under a public-private partnership model. That permit was a key draw for students to attend private colleges that team up with public colleges through curriculum licensing agreements.
Source: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/bus...rnational-students-who-spent-years-finding-a/ (The Globe and Mail)
මේක ගැන තියෙන වෙනත් වීඩියෝ වලින් කීපයක් :
