What can our sector do to "lure people in" to provide the appearance that we're for all, that our services and information are not only authoritative, accurate, up to date, and useful, but also competitive with these slick predatory app developers and others?

Having responsive, automated FAQ-style information for common inquiries available 24/7 in different languages is clearly becoming more technically possible. I wonder how our sector will be able to harness (and be funded to harness, let's be honest) these potential innovations in a seamless newcomer settlement journey and service experience.

In this podcast episode, I’m chatting with Whitney Loewen the manager of E learning and special projects at The Immigrant Education Society (TIES) in Calgary. I reached out to Whitney after discovering their Newcomer Introduction to Classes Online project, or NICO.

This report looked at the opportunities and limitations of digital tools in the Organization for Migration (IOM) Canadian Orientation Abroad Programme's (COA) Pre-Departure Orientation Training for refugees coming to Canada.

This report presents findings, insights, and recommendations generated through a comprehensive exploration of hybrid service delivery over 6 months in the immigrant settlement sector in Canada. The report analyzes the unique experiment in digital service delivery created by the pandemic and reviews sector innovation and collaboration while providing a roadmap for the sector and its largest funder, Immigration, Refugees, and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) towards a hybrid service delivery model.

This survey provides a snapshot of the Canadian immigrant and refugee-serving sector at during the first month of working remotely as a result of COVID-19. It looks at what is working, sector challenges and concerns and sector successes and failures from both the front-line and management perspective.

The pandemic meant that everyone had to move services online. For New Canadians, that move was probably easier than many. Already adept at online content sharing, as well as an OMNI TV show that's run for a number of years, it made sense that they would create something like Café New Canadians, a virtual event series.

Created by Ottawa-based Capital Rainbow Refuge, the Queer Refugee Hearings Program (QRHP) Toolkit aims to "assist individuals claiming refugee protection based on sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, and/or sex characteristics (SOGIESC).

The Canadian Council for Refugees worked with others to develop ethical guidelines for research with people in situations of forced migration. The guidelines include a checklist for organizations who are approached by researchers, to help evaluate whether the research will be conducted ethically, and taking into consideration the particular vulnerabilities of people who have been forcibly displaced.