Nick Noorani & Immigrant Networks - information you can use to help Newcomers find work now
Aug 9, 2023 03:00 PM Eastern
You probably know Nick Noorani. You may not know his latest venture - Immigrant Networks. Immigrant Networks is the fastest growing Newcomer community speaking to immigrants, refugees, international students and work permit holders on employment and access to jobs.
Why is it the fastest growing Newcomer employment network? Join Nick and I to find out.
Nick will share Immigrant Network's 2023 research report with information that is essential for you to know.
Transforming Settlement: Social Media & Hybrid Delivery Evaluation
August 15th , 2023 1 PM Eastern
WESO (Wired: Evaluating Settlement Online) and CERC in Migration and Integration from Toronto Metropolitan University are collaborating to empower settlement service providers by leveraging social media, evaluating hybrid service delivery, and enabling effective newcomer integration within service provider organizations in our upcoming workshop: Transforming Settlement: Social Media & Hybrid Delivery Evaluation
WESO will present their WESO Toolkit which will discuss key areas for settlement services like: capacity building, quality assessment, data analysis, and resource allocation. While CERC will focus on addressing the awareness gap among newcomers, leveraging online media, adopting new technologies, and presenting their Social Media Toolkit.
Virtual Bridge Workshop 2 - Connecting with newcomers online: How can AI help?
Aug. 16-17, 2023
Time: 1-2:30 PM EDT (both days)
Location: Online via Zoom
Join me for a workshop that will bring together leaders in the settlement sector Stein MonteiroNick (Naeem) Noorani, Aimee Holmes, Waseem JAWAD, Farrah Nakhaie, PhD, Matthew Dunlop, Elie Bahhadi, Ruslan Kurt who have adopted artificial intelligence (AI) in their communications and service delivery practices in order to deliver programs to targeted audiences
This workshop, spread over 2 days, will be chaired by CERC in Migration & Integration, Toronto Metropolitan University, and is co-convened by The TNO - The Neighbourhood Organization and Jumpstart Refugee Talent.
In this workshop, participants will explore:
Government of Canada awards contracts to help modernize immigration and citizenship services
This is interesting: “the Government of Canada has awarded 2 contracts, with a combined initial value of $85.4 million, to develop the new Client Experience Platform, which will provide clients with a more user-friendly interface to access Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) programs and services. Once fully implemented over the next few years, the new platform will provide the tools and capabilities needed to offer a seamless client experience, enable IRCC to personalize services to clients, and replace outdated client-facing portals and tools.
A $10.5 million contract has been awarded to Salesforce Canada Corporation, a software-as-a-service publisher that will provide the core technology, licensing, support and maintenance for the platform. This 5-year contract has options to be extended by 15 additional years. Another $74.9 million contract has been awarded to Accenture Inc., a systems integrator that will provide services as needed to support configurations, customizations and implementation of the new platform.”
The seamless experience of course needs to extend beyond immigration processing to settlement. There are sector organizations using Salesforce, it has elements of interoperability. But will IRCC build with that broader vision in mind?
Some of you are Salesforce-using folks. I'm curious what you think of this announcement and how it might position future possibilities for interoperability within and outside of Salesforce.
SCVO Digital Inclusion Masterclass: What are Essential Digital Skills? (webinar recording)
In this July 2023 Scottish Council for Voluntary Organizations' webinar Digital Inclusion Development Officer Jason Railton delves into Essential Digital Skills, and how they can be used to support people online. The webinar shows you how you can use the Essential Digital Skills Toolkit and the SCVO check-up tool to support learners to upskill and make sure that they're ready for the future.
Forced Migration Current Awareness - Thematic Focus: ICTs & Other Technologies
Their recent post includes short articles, reports and journal articles, and multimedia pieces exploring the use of technology related to to refugees, asylum-seekers, internally displaced persons (IDPs), and other forced migrants.
UNHCR's Digital Transformation Strategy - 2022 - 2026
"The Digital Transformation Strategy provides a unified vision and approach to realizing the rights of refugees to digital inclusion and protection. It also guides UNHCR in reshaping our use of digital channels and associated technology to achieve our strategic objectives. UNHCR’s vision is for the communities we serve to have the digital skills, agency, and tools to safely engage in today’s digital world, to access inclusive services, achieve greater self-reliance and protection, and to have a greater voice in the decisions that impact their lives. To achieve this, UNHCR’s supporting vision is to transform the way it works, innovating digitally to create efficiencies, improve knowledge sharing, engagement and collaboration, mobilize resources and increase our impact."
You probably heard about the federal cabinet shuffle. IRCC has a new minister - Marc Miller. Here's a useful article with background info. The article reminds us that "the Prime Minister may decide to issue new mandate letters to cabinet, outlining what each minister is expected to focus on while serving in their role.. A new one hasn't been issued yet, but here's the previous one.
On LinkedIn, someone reminded me in a post that there are also Parliamentary Secretaries who "assist the minister in such manner as the minister directs." Marie-France Lalonde is Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship.
WES Weekly Roundup July 26, 2023
The weekly roundup includes research, stories, and events of interest to the Canadian immigration and settlement community. Includes: Alberta, and the rest of Canada, are woefully unprepared for the coming immigration boom, What’s the Right Number of Newcomers to Welcome to Canada?, Canada Announces New $212m Funding for Interim Housing Assistance Program for Refugees, Paying it forward: A P.E.I. program helps newcomers build community and get established, and more.
WES Weekly Roundup July 19, 2023
The weekly roundup includes research, stories, and events of interest to the Canadian immigration and settlement community. Includes: Ottawa removes education requirement for Hong Kongers pursuing permanent residency in Canada, Experts weigh in on Professional Engineers Ontario’s removal of Canadian experience requirement for licensing, Canada launches pathway to reunite families and support Ukrainians, Building Meaningful Refugee Participation into Protection Policymaking, and more.
Equitable Service Planning & Delivery: A NEW Toolkit from Ottawa Local Immigration Partnership
This new toolkit is designed to assist service provider organizations to plan and deliver services that are relevant and accessible to immigrants and racialized populations. The Equitable Service Planning & Delivery Toolkit was commissioned by OLIP, developed by QuakeLab with extensive input from the members of the Equity Ottawa Partnership.
The Toolkit is comprised of 7 tools addressing different aspects of service planning and delivery, from the upstream issue of determining need, effective and sustainable community engagement, recruiting teams, targeting services with data and evidence, and assessment to ensure sustainable progress and healthy workplace.
Please take this short 7-question survey where you can tell us how we are doing and how we might do better. This survey is anonymous. Your feedback will be used to improve the KM4S.ca website. Thank you for your feedback! (click on the screen anywhere (or on the x in the top right corner) to remove this pop-up)