The Government of Canada announced Apr. 27 that foreign students attending Canadian universities and colleges would be allowed to work off-campus as part of its new Off-Campus Work Permit Program.
This comes as good news to tourism operators trying to cope with labour shortages in many parts of the country. Until now, over 150,000 foreign students have been restricted from working off-campus while attending school in Canada. The new permit allows 100,000 eligible students to apply for off-campus jobs, for up to 20 hours a week during the school year and full-time during study breaks, as long as they keep up their grades.
To be eligible, students must be in the country studying full-time at a college or university for at least six months before they apply for a work permit. The program also allows them to work up to two years after graduation.
Before the rule change, foreign students were limited to working jobs on-campus.
“It will mean that in areas where there is a concentration of post-secondary institutions, it should provide some additional workers for our industry and I think that will be great news,” said Michael Ferrabee, Canadian Restaurant and Foodservices Association (CRFA) executive vice-president of government affairs. The CRFA met with Citizenship and Immigration officials in early April to discuss labour shortage issues, particularly in Alberta and British Columbia.
Universities and colleges warned that limiting foreign students to working on-campus would discourage foreign students from coming to Canada, especially with rising tuition costs.
Between 2003 and 2005, CIC implemented post-graduation work permit extension pilot projects in New Brunswick, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia, and Newfoundland and Labrador.
Now, with the new system in place, international students can have a more complete experience when they study in Canada, said George Soule, national chairman of the Canadian Federation of Students.
“It means that an international student sitting next to a domestic student now gets treated that much more equally,” he recently told The Globe and Mail.
Reprinted with permission. ‘Feds say foreign students can now work off-campus’ front page, Pacific/Prairie Restaurant News, June 2006.
