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Enriching Foreign Qualifications Through Canadian Post-secondary Education: Who Participates and Why?

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Abstract

The Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Canada is employed to compare recent immigrant post-secondary education participants and non-participants with respect to a range of factors, including demographic, socio-economic, and cultural differences, official language competency, recognition of educational credentials and employment experiences, and social capital. A multilevel logit model was employed to identify the (changing) impact of factors on post-secondary participation. The cumulative post-secondary participation rate increased from 10% to 33% to 44% within 6 months, 2 years and 4 years of arrival, respectively. Gender, age, prior level of education, self-reported language proficiency, social capital and situational factors were significant in explaining the cumulative increase.

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Notes

  1. The recent launch of the Canadian Experience Class (CEC) by the Canadian Federal Government is a recognition of these findings, as it provides a more facilitative means for foreign nationals, with educational (and work) experience in Canada, to apply for permanent residence.

  2. Since readiness for post-secondary education in the host country is key to enrolment, we do not include in the study adult immigrants who never attended PSE in their countries because they were not as ready as the post-secondary educated immigrants to meet PSE requirements in Canada within 4 years of arrival (time interval covered by LSIC). We also make note that only a small fraction of recent immigrants aged 25–49 (less than 20%) did not have PSE at arrival.

  3. The relative values of the weights are not changed, but they are set so that the mean is 1, and the sum of weights equals the n of cases.

  4. Counts are rounded to the nearest tens and proportions to the nearest unit. Means (and standard deviations) are rounded to the nearest tenth.

  5. OECD differentiates ‘formal’ education that follows a ladder system and ‘non-formal’ education that is organized and sustained learning that takes place within and outside educational institutions and is addressed to all ages.

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Disclaimer

The analyses in this report are based on data from Statistics Canada. The opinions and interpretation expressed by the authors do not represent the views of Statistics Canada.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Educational Leadership and Policy Studies, College of Education and Health Professions, University of Texas, Arlington, USA

    Maria Adamuti-Trache

  2. Department of Sociology, York University, Toronto, Canada

    Paul Anisef

  3. Faculty of Education, Lakehead University, Thunder Bay, Canada

    Robert Sweet

  4. Department of Sociology and Anthropology, University of Guelph, Guelph, Canada

    David Walters

Authors
  1. Maria Adamuti-Trache
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  2. Paul Anisef
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  3. Robert Sweet
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  4. David Walters
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Correspondence to Paul Anisef.

Additional information

This research was funded by the Research and Evaluation Branch of Citizenship and Immigration Canada. This paper expresses the views and opinions of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official policy or opinion of Citizenship and Immigration Canada or the Government of Canada.

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Adamuti-Trache, M., Anisef, P., Sweet, R. et al. Enriching Foreign Qualifications Through Canadian Post-secondary Education: Who Participates and Why?. Int. Migration & Integration 14, 139–156 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12134-011-0228-y

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