Access Alliance Multicultural Health and Community Services (Access Alliance) works for most vulnerable (socially marginalized and/or medically complex) residents of Toronto, for over 30 years, irrespective of their immigration or health insurance status. While working on the social determinants of Health, the research department of the agency identified that internationally educated researchers (IER) are a potential group of immigrants who requires a particular range of settlement support for successful integration into mainstream research. As such we created two intertwined projects- Immigrant Insight Scholar (IIS), and Immigrant Researchers Support Network (IRSN).
Insights, that we generated from anecdotal stories of our Immigrant Insight Scholar (IIS) fellows, and research findings of our labour market study project have made us realize that short term fellowship opportunities is the most efficient means for IERs to launch their career in Canada. We created evidences that a newcomer researcher would be the most eligible candidate to carry out this task for two reasons:
1) lived experience as a newcomer might have provided this candidate with insights on use of Labour Market Information (LMI) data by immigrants, barriers preventing them from accessing this and its relevance in guiding them in making informed choices to undertake skill development and educational opportunities
2) by assisting a newcomer to launch their career in Canada through a project which is intended to create positive impact for newcomer job seekers, we will be enabling this candidate to become the co-producer of knowledge and change thus making this research initiative impact oriented at its very nascent stage.
We have created the Immigrant Researchers Support Network (IRSN)to promote professional networking and peer support for internationally educated researchers. Goal of the IRSN project is to support the professional success of internationally-trained researchers and evaluators by promoting active peer support and providing appropriate opportunities for career networking and professional development.
IRSN provides support to unemployed and underemployed immigrant researchers and evaluators by:
- Developing opportunities for peer and professional networking
- Promoting awareness of relevant employment services
- Developing links with potential employers, and
- Offering selected one-time training and learning opportunities
Scopes for learning and training opportunities include (not limited to):
- Training on Canadian research practices and standards, e.g. TCPS
- A review of existing employment supports from a community provider
- Use of social media for professional networking
- Introduction to Canadian labour market data and databases
- Knowledge Mobilization (more hands on with individual exercises and small group review following presentation and examples)
- An introduction to the Canadian Evaluation Society
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