ORIENTATION PILOT PROGRAM FOR REFUGEES REINFORCES COMMUNITY CONNECTIONS
What’s new:
WorkSafeBC developed a Syrian worker orientation pilot program along with the SUCCESS multicultural organization and promoted it during a Refugee Response Team meeting in Vancouver, British Columbia in May 2016, according to documents obtained through the provincial Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act from the Ministry of Jobs, Tourism and Skills Training and Minister Responsible for Labour of British Columbia.
Why it’s important:
The meeting agenda shows that WorkSafeBC encouraged local immigrant organizations who attended the meeting to adopt and deliver the meeting. This is important and helpful because it shows the value of partnerships between a health and safety regulator like WorksafeBC and local community organizations.
Scott McCloy, Director of Government, Community and Media Relations with WorkSafeBC, emphasizes their role a regulatory body independent of the provincial government. McCloy also highlights that community organizations have local expertise with regards to individual client requirements and are able to connect and communicate directly to their clients in Arabic to inform them about the workshop. In these preliminary stages, the aim of the pilot program is to make work-ready Arabic speaking immigrants, including the large influx from Syria, “aware of their rights as employees and employers”, according to McCloy.
What the government says:
The Ministry of Jobs, Tourism, and Skills Training was contacted eight times by email and telephone when asked about their role in orientation programs for new Syrian refugees. In an email from Sheldon Johnson, Communications Manager, the Ministry referred back to WorkSafeBC, as “WorkSafeBC is entirely independent and industry funded. Therefore they really are the best people to talk to about their program.” When asked again regarding this Ministry of Jobs, Tourism, and Skills Training’s specific role with regards to orientation programs for new immigrants in terms of workshop conception, development, monitoring and evaluation, including programs for Syrian refugees, they did not reply.
What others say:
The Immigrant Services Society of British Columbia did publish a poster online advertising the workshop. However, Jennifer York, Senior Manager of Settlement Services, emphasized that facilitators contacted their clients directly to advertised the program. She also mentioned that each facilitator tailored the workshop to their clients’ needs, and that two workshops were delivered in English with a translator and one facilitator delivered the workshop in Arabic, which had the most attendance. The workshops, while geared for Syrian refugees, were also attended by participants from other parts of the Arabic speaking world, such as Iraq, and included cultural sensitivities: the facilitators outlined differences in working culture between the participants’ home countries and British Columbia.
York also highlighted the benefits of delivering the workshop in Arabic as well as with an English interpreter. Delivering in both languages at different times allows them to reach more people. Also, providing the program in Arabic creates a more comfortable environment where attendees tended to ask more questions and engage more. On the other hand, delivering the workshop in English served as another teaching method, as participants were able to learn specific terms about their safety and rights as employees in their mother tongue, as well as their language of work.
What’s next:
WorkSafeBC will evaluate the pilot program in June 2017 based on the survey data they will receive from the community organizations that delivered the workshop. This data will dictate future steps and how to improve the program, according to McCloy, and shape the program’s scope and content in the future.
York says that this particular program is ideally tailored for Syrian refugees, but was also attended by other Arabic speaking participants from other parts of the world, including Iraq. York emphasizes that in the future, it would be useful to be provided with programs that would benefit all the groups they service, not only Syrian refugees.