Studying in Canada? Want to Stay? Prepare to enter the Beauty Contest!
Canada has a new immigration beauty contest called the Express Entry System and whether you are an international student or an experienced international worker, everyone must compete on the same pitch to win a ticket to Canada.
How does that change your thinking as a person who wants to study and work in Canada? It means that finding success over time is out and the need for immediate success is the new requirement. It means that you need to assess your chances of finding a job in Canada before you apply to study in Canada, otherwise you might be wasting your time, effort and money in studying in Canada.
At Uniivaa, we have previously written about Canada’s new Express Entry System. In short, workers who desire permanent residency in Canada all enter into one competing beauty contest. There are 1,200 available points in the contest, 600 of which are given to you by the employer through a Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA) job offer, and 600 of which are based upon your personal profile. Every month, certain people win. No one is quite sure how or why, but each month the contest starts all over again.
For some reason, it came as a bit of a surprise to international students that they would be included in this beauty contest. Is it fair that a family who spends large amounts of money in Canada on education and housing have to compete with an international worker who has never stepped foot in or spent a single dollar in Canada? Should newly graduated and Canadian educated international rocket scientists be in the same system as experienced international carpenters?
Who knows? Really it does not matter. All that matters is that having a job offer is essential in the new system whether you are an international student in Canada or you are sitting at your computer in another country. Student or no student, if you have a job offer you start at 600 points and go up from there based on your profile. Without a job offer the maximum points you can get is 600. You do the math.
The old system was based on building Canadian experience and connection. Come to Canada, study, get a degree, learn English, make some connections, work for a while and apply for permanent residency. The system was based on the belief that it really does take time to become successful in Canada but on the other hand this extended time in Canada showed commitment.
The new system is the opposite of this thinking. It is based on finding people who will have immediate success in Canada. The best way to determine your chances of instant success is if a Canadian employer validates you through a job offer. Perhaps your chances are better if you studied in Canada and have a Canadian degree or diploma, but the new system maintains it is the job offer and not the education that increases the odds of instant success.
Everyone concedes that there are new winners and losers within the Express Entry System. Of course, the whole system could change overnight. But for now, if you are considering studying in Canada you need to start thinking about one single thing: what are my chances of getting a job in Canada?