5 Immigration Pathways to Canada
By: Yulia Kan
Tags: Immigration Pathways, Canadian Immigration, Immigration, Advice, Canada

Immigration Advice

Today is international migrants day, a ‘holiday’ that was publicly announced only last year making this year a second annual recurrence. Happy migrants day to my fellow immigrants!

Immigration is deeply rooted within my identity: I am a third generation Russian-born Korean, currently living in Canada and waiting for my Canadian citizenship to be approved any day now! Last year I shared my immigration story in my blog, if you are interested, the link is here. Besides (or because of) it running in my blood, immigration is also a career field that I decided to pursue in my third year of university.

Currently I try to help Canada address its ageing population by bringing in skilled workers from abroad, help families reunite, and assist students in achieving their dreams of coming to Canada to study. Also at some point in 2017 I was advising many worried Americans on their immigration options after the election.

Today, in honour of such a wonderful day celebrating global mobility, I would like to share the 5 main pathways of immigration to Canada in case any of you are ever looking to relocate to another country to start a new life or simply to expand your global presence.

The Student Pathway

You make your way from pretty much the bottom of the chain by coming here to obtain post-secondary education. Don’t be fooled, this pathway is not as easy as a lot of people think it is. While it is a highly booming business and a decent source of income for the Canadian economy, Canada is very selective with the nationals that get their study permits approved. Recent statistics show that overall, the refusal percentage increased over the years. It went from 33% overall refusals in 2017, to 52% in 2020. Approval rates went from 67% in 2017 to 50% in 2020. Below are the 3 most common criteria against which officers assess a study permit application:

-Enough finances to cover tuition and living expenses;

-Socio-economic ties to your country of citizenship: what would you be leaving behind that you will be coming back to; and

-How the program of study matches your previous education and career aspirations.

This process gets more challenging depending on where you are from and whether or not you were refused entry to other countries. If you did, it might negatively impact your application.

The Skilled Worker Pathway

Coming to Canada on a work permit is quite juxtaposed; It is either very easy, or very hard.

The hard way is you find yourself an employer that gives you a job offer to come work in Canada. Your citizenship, combined with the nature of your job offer, will dictate the difficulty level and processing time of the process.

For example: if you are from a country that requires a Temporary Resident Visa to enter Canada, the processing time alone can take anywhere between 4 weeks to 5 months at minimum. That’s without counting the time spent on preparing and collecting documents.

Turn the above example into a more positive one: you are from a country that only requires an Electronic Travel Authorization, the processing time for you can be as much as 24 hours. A couple of hours to process the offer of employment on-line assuming the employer has an account with IRCC (Immigration, Refugee and Citizenship Canada), then you board the plane and get your work permit upon arrival.

The easy way is that you are a lucky citizen of a country that is listed on the International Experience Canada list. Participating countries established a cultural exchange program with Canada for young individuals allowing cultural exchange and enrichment. You have to be within a certain age and be a national of one of those participating countries and that’s it: no need to obtain a Canadian job offer, you are welcome to come on a free work permit! Well, it’s not technically free because you will incur expenses for government fees, medical exams, insurances, etc. But in my opinion, a small fee to pay to get a chance to experience a country and live in it.

Direct Permanent Residence Pathway

I think it should be noted here that the first 2 pathways are considered to be temporary residence pathways. Study and Work Permits have a validity period and there are associated limitations with extending them. For direct PR pathway, if you are:

-under 29 years of age

-single/unmarried

-hold a Master’s Degree

-speak perfect English (or French)

-have 3 years of skilled work experience

You might get a chance to be selected to apply. The most popular program under this pathway is called Express Entry. It allocates points based on age, education, language proficiency, etc, and if you generate a competitive score, you would be issued an invitation to apply for PR. For a detailed points breakdown, visit the link here, you want to try and achieve 470 points based on the most recent trends.

A Direct Pathway to PR Through Family Sponsorship

If you marry a Canadian Citizen/PR holder or you’ve been in a common law relationship (residing together for 12 continuous months), you can be sponsored under the family class. The same applies to children and/or parents/grandparents of Canadian nationals. Sharing a link from our company website for a detailed overview:

The Investor/Entrepreneur Pathway

This class is merely for high net-worth individuals who have an interest and available funds to invest into the Canadian economy. The premise here is that you are a wealthy businessman with years of experience, who wants to open up a business or buy an existing business for the purpose of immigrating. On average, you need to have a net-worth of $600,000 CAD and have $200,000 CAD available for investment. And then, depending on the province of interest, there are specific criteria that must be met.

*Disclaimer*: many pathways don’t offer direct permanent residence. Eligible applicant will be issued a work permit at first and after a year of active involvement will be allowed to submit an application for Permanent Residence.

These are the main pathways for immigration to Canada, and with this I conclude my first publication on this platform. Thank you to those who made it to here, I hope you learned something new today or were left inspired. Happy Holidays!

For any inquiries about immigration to Canada, feel free to message me and I can share more information!