A profile of foreign students who transition to permanent resident status in Atlantic Canada

Introduction and overview

This paper has been prepared at the request of the Atlantic Population Table. The Atlantic Population Table (APT) is a multistakeholder initiative of key federal and provincial partners, namely the Atlantic Opportunities Agency (ACOA), the four Atlantic Provinces, HRSDC and CIC, working together in support of regional development, including increased immigration to meet local needs.

There are five streams of the APT initiative: Attraction and Promotion, Awareness, Retention, Research and Labour Market Integration. Under the research stream a comprehensive three year research plan (2007-2010) was developed, based on priorities identified by the APT Research Sub-Committee.

One of the key priority areas to be examined over the three year period was the attraction, promotion and retention of immigrants to Atlantic Canada. The focus of research projects in the first year was to provide a demographic and socioeconomic profile of immigrants in Atlantic Canada in order to better understand the dynamic of population movements as they affect the Atlantic region and identify regional needs and strategies to attract and retain immigrants. Developing a profile of foreign students who transition to permanent resident status in Atlantic Canada was identified as a priority.

In addition to describing the characteristics of foreign students who transition to permanent resident status in Atlantic Canada, the paper also attempts to identify what contributions they could potentially make to the labour force. Where possible, the focus of this paper is at the provincial level, but in some cases, the numbers are small and the geographic region is the entire Atlantic Region. In some cases similarities or differences in trends between Atlantic Canada and the rest of Canada (RoC) are highlighted so as to give context to the situation in Atlantic Canada. The data used for this report cover the period 1999 to 2009 and include the period prior to the announcement of the Canadian Experience Class (CEC) program in November 2008. Thus, these findings could inform future analyses of the impact of the CEC program of foreign students, one group that it was designed to target. The first permanent residents under the CEC program landed in 2009.

Given concerns about low population growth in Atlantic Canada, especially in view of attractive labour market opportunities in Canada’s west over the same time period, attraction and retention of immigrants and foreign students is, and has been, an important consideration in maintaining or increasing the region’s population. In fact, the various provincial governments have put in place strategies to encourage foreign students to remain in Atlantic Canada. For example,

In 2007, the province of Nova Scotia added the component of “International Graduate Stream” to its Provincial Nominee Program that fast tracks the landing process for those international students who wish to stay in the province after finishing their studies. …The province of New Brunswick also signed an agreement with the federal government that makes it easier for foreign graduates in New Brunswick to gain an additional year of work experience in their field of study. This change is expected to help graduates who wish to apply for permanent resident status as skilled workers by providing them with additional points on the selection grid in their area of expertise. Footnote 1

The purpose of this profile is to describe foreign students who chose to remain in Atlantic Canada as permanent residents with a view to providing background knowledge for the further development of attraction and retention strategies in Atlantic Canada.

Immigration

Immigration is an important aspect of population growth in Canada and, as in the rest of Canada, Atlantic Canada looks to immigrants to provide labour market growth and talent. According to Statistics Canada’s Reference Scenario Population Projections for the period 2006 to 2031, immigrants accounted for 19.8% of Canada’s population in 2006 and will account for 26.5% of Canada’s population by 2031Footnote 2. Over the same period, Statistics Canada projects the proportion of immigrants in the population of Atlantic Canada to increase from 4% to 6%. Thus, in Atlantic Canada, immigrants represent a smaller but growing share of the population. These projections are based on past years’ trends, which are the focus of this paper, and plausible scenarios regarding the future.

Within the immigrant group, considerable interest is focussing on those who transition from foreign student to permanent resident status. With their Canadian credentials, higher language proficiency, and social networking and work experience in Canada, it is expected that they will integrate quickly into the labour market and society.

Table 1 shows the number of new permanent residents who intended to reside in Canada and Atlantic Canada over the past 10 years. It indicates that a relatively small proportion of Canada’s newcomers intended to reside in Atlantic Canada over the period. In 2009, about 2.6% of Canada’s new permanent residents intended to settle in Atlantic Canada, a slightly higher proportion than at the beginning of the period (1.4%).

With regard to specific Atlantic provinces, the table shows that over the past ten years, Nova Scotia, Atlantic Canada’s most populous province, has attracted the majority of new permanent residents. However, New Brunswick and PEI also experienced noticeable increases in new permanent residents starting in 2005 and 2007 respectively.

Table 1: Canada — New permanent residents Footnote 3 by province or territory, 1999-2009
Province 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009
Newfoundland and Labrador 424 417 392 404 359 579 497 508 546 616 603
Prince Edward Island 135 189 135 108 154 310 330 565 992 1,443 1,723
Nova Scotia 1,595 1,608 1,698 1,419 1,474 1,771 1,929 2,586 2,523 2,651 2,424
New Brunswick 659 758 798 705 666 795 1,091 1,646 1,643 1,856 1,913
Atlantic Canada 2,813 2,972 3,023 2,636 2,653 3,455 3,847 5,305 5,704 6,566 6,663
Quebec 29,149 32,498 37,598 37,581 39,555 44,245 43,315 44,684 45,201 45,220 49,493
Ontario 104,167 133,510 148,641 133,588 119,722 125,094 140,525 125,892 111,315 110,878 106,867
Manitoba 3,725 4,635 4,591 4,615 6,503 7,426 8,096 10,047 10,954 11,218 13,520
Saskatchewan 1,728 1,882 1,704 1,667 1,668 1,943 2,119 2,724 3,516 4,835 6,890
Alberta 12,095 14,363 16,405 14,783 15,839 16,475 19,404 20,716 20,861 24,199 27,017
British Columbia 36,122 37,428 38,482 34,057 35,229 37,028 44,770 42,083 38,961 43,992 41,438
Yukon Territory 76 59 65 50 59 62 65 65 83 110 174
Northwest Territories 58 83 95 60 94 89 84 98 88 127 107
Nunavut 14 13 13 12 11 8 12 12 19 50 10
Province not stated 5 12 23 15 4 16 52 52
Canada 189,952 227,455 250,640 229,049 221,348 235,825 262,241 251,642 236,754 247,247 252,179

Source: Citizenship & Immigration Canada, RDM, Facts and Figures 2009

Data

This paper relies on data available in Citizenship and Immigration Canada’s Research Data Mart. The Research and Evaluation Branch converts data from Citizenship and Immigration’s administrative systems to analytical data that can be used for research purposes. The analysis uses Facts and Figures 2009 data.

The administrative data on which the RDM is based are collected at the time of entry to Canada and updated at every change in status. The data describe the purpose of entry to Canada and basic information about the entrant such as sex, age, country of origin, and level of study for persons entering with a study permit. The data also include details about changes in that status, for example from foreign student status or foreign worker status to permanent resident status, whether they are the principal applicant or the spouse or dependent of the principal applicant and in which province the applicant intends to reside.

The data selected for this profile describe permanent residents who intended to reside in Atlantic Canada and whose previous yearly statusFootnote 4 in Canada was foreign student whether in the Atlantic Region or elsewhere in Canada. Therefore, people who transition to permanent resident status whose last yearly status was foreign worker and who may at some point in the past have been foreign students are not includedFootnote 5. Furthermore, those who were granted permanent resident status elsewhere in Canada after studying in Atlantic Canada are also not included although Table 5 gives an indication of to what extent foreign students who studied in Atlantic Canada have transitioned to permanent resident status in provinces outside Atlantic Canada over the past ten years.

Finally, the unit of analysis for this profile is the individual. Individuals subject to the same application for permanent residence in Atlantic Canada are not necessarily included in the analysis as the last yearly status of each individual may differ from one to another. For example, a person landed as an accompanying dependant through the Provincial Nominee Program is included in the population of interest for this study if this person’s last yearly status is foreign student, but the principal applicant is not included if his (her) previous status was foreign worker.

This being said, the “Other Considerations” section of this paper will attempt to capture the volume and some key characteristics of foreign workers who transitioned to permanent resident status in Atlantic Canada after holding post-graduate permits and therefore who must have been foreign students in the preceding year(s).

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