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What can someone say about this. I copied it from a site and I need clarification.I was a Doctor in Nigeria, now a Cleaner in Canada - Nigerian abroad Lamentations Of Other Nigerian ProfessionalsSaturday, May 30, 2009People leave their home country with a dream of living a better life. But they tend to be oblivious of the challenges or, more realistically put, obstacles lying ahead. Not all of them get success in this endeavour. In this compilation by LAOLU AFOLABI, the travails of Nigerian professionals and other foreign nationals in Canada are brought to the fore.http://odili.net/news/source/2009/may/30/606.htmlCanada is a land of 10 million square miles. Its population is below 30 million and its rate of growth is less than 0.9 per cent. In addition, the next-door neighbour country is the United States, which offers huge job opportunities.For all these reasons, Canada suffers from human resource deficiency throughout the year. This country attracts millions of people from around the globe, regardless of religion, belief and ideology due to its easy immigration system. Peaceful coexistence and support from government have encouraged people around the globe to migrate to Canada.Harsh RealityAlthough Canada provides warm welcome to new immigrants, the job market behaves the opposite. The country tends to favour the ‘True Canadians’ who are your next generation offspring. The new immigrants face the harsh inbuilt dichotomy of the job market as it is impossible to get a job without experience in Canada which itself, cannot be gained without a job.Falling into this vicious cycle, the new immigrants give up their last hope of getting a good job. So many immigrants, including taxi drivers, got Ph.D but had to engage in menial jobs, as there had been no job for them.This is a fairly common phenomenon, which scares new applicants. Although this is not the very common situation, every applicant has to bear in mind that he/she has to go through a series of hardship in getting their desired jobs. Applicant has to be mentally and physically prepared for a long struggle to see him/herself in a desired position.In Canada, services in various sectors such as engineering, medical and education are maintained by respective regulatory bodies through various acts. That is why a person who seeks a job as an engineer has to take a licence of professional engineering; medical professionals such as doctors have to take recourse of a long process for getting certified by the Medical of Canada; nurses have to undertake certified test; for accountants, CMA certificate is mandatory; for the teachers of primary and secondary levels, teachers’ certificate is required; IT specialists have to acquire certificate on various modules; pharmacists require certification in Pharmacy.The boldness, perseverance and doggedness of many Nigerians, coupled with their native intelligence, often result in the emergence of very capable, exceptionally intelligent high achievers. When the playing field is level, Nigerians have a knack of shining in many areas of human endeavour, particularly in the ‘professions’ i.e. Accounting, Law, Academics, Computer Science, Medicine, Education, Engineering etc. Just pick up the graduation/commencement brochure of any US high school or college with Nigerian students and look at their rankings.It is a great irony to many in the immigration field, and to newcomers themselves, a bitter joke. Canada has a shortage of skilled professionals, and yet thousands of internationally trained doctors, engineers, teachers and nurses are forced to deliver pizzas and drive taxis.“What angers me is we are a capable people. We have the credentials. We just can’t get the jobs,” complained a Nigerian, who feels the government has shattered his hopes and dreams.Last year, when Canada changed the way it selects immigrants, many were happy to see the end of the old system, which matched newcomers with worker shortages. Now, Canada chooses immigrants not on their occupation, but on their education, skills and language abilities. Applicants must score 67 of a possible 100 points to be accepted.Ostensibly, being talented and smart should make them more employable. But it isn’t working out that way. Canada is recruiting the right kind of people, but they are stuck in a bottleneck, as the agencies and bodies that regulate the fields of Medicine, Teaching and Nursing struggle to assess their qualifications.“We have a disaster on our hands,” says Joan Atlin, Executive Director of the Association of International Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario.“There are thousands of under-employed foreign professionals across the country. At the same time, we have a shortage of skilled professionals, especially in the health-care field. We don’t so much have a doctor shortage as an assessment and licensing bottleneck,” she said.A recent statistics in Canada which studies 164,200 immigrants who arrived between 2000 and 2001 found that 70 per cent had problems entering the labour force. Six in every 10 were forced to take jobs other than those they were trained to do. The two most common occupational groups for men were Science (natural and applied) and Management, but most ended up working in sales and service or processing and manufacturing.There was a conference on the subject of Canadian experience and, in attendance, were dozens of foreign-trained professionals – some Nigerian bankers, doctors and engineers who are not working in their professions.At the conference, the lamentations were, in summation: “We are highly skilled men and women who arrived in Canada and are not allowed to do what we were trained to do.” People who want to come to Canada are not told what to expect.In the conference, a banker said, “When I applied, I had to qualify. There are marks for experience, education and so on. You have to get 70 marks. I got 72. When I came here, I found my degrees were worth nothing, useful only to work at a cold room. I left a banking job in Nigeria and here, though I was living in a foreign land, a dream of many years, I am not fulfilled.”Also, a medical doctor said “I never knew it would be difficult to get a medical licence here. But I don’t know it would be such a bureaucratic, disheartening and, ultimately, fruitless journey. I sent my application to the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons two and a half years ago, and I haven’t even received a response. I was worried my file might be lost in a drawer somewhere. I am ready to go anywhere, even rural Saskatchewan, small-town Ontario.“After being certified a doctor in Nigeria, I got employment as a cleaner here. It’s so disturbing. Anytime some of the doctors here have a problem, they come to me for help.They know what I can do, but to them, I have not obtained Canadian qualification. “I have been cleaning the hospital here, in fact, I have even been a babysitter,” she lamented. Another doctor at the meeting had once applied for a job as a health care worker. The answer was “sorry, you are overqualified.” The doctor then applied for work as a medical secretary and was told 30 words per minute wasn’t good enough and in any case, where is the diploma in secretarial skills? A final insult, the doctor could not get a job as a personal support worker: No experience, no qualifications.Other foreign professionals in that country also have a taste of the experience. In their homelands, they are engineers, professors, doctors and business people. Now, they drive cabs.Leon KalemkerianLeon Kalemkerian, an engineer in Iraq, drives a Limo in Toronto. “It takes no time for a dream to turn into a nightmare,” Kalemkerian said.The electronics engineer, now 59, emigrated from Iraq in 1995 to provide a better life and more opportunities for his three children – and a job for himself. Kalemkerian has been driving Limousine for nine years. He said he tried everything possible to get his qualifications recognised in Canada. “I was told I have good work experience but I should have Canadian education,” Kalemkerian said. Even though he completed courses in Ethics and Law at the University of Toronto, that wasn’t enough.Reza Hosseinioun“Everything about Economics is fascinating,” says Mohammad Reza Hosseinioun. Hosseinioun, who goes by the name Reza, has a PhD in Economics and now drives a cab in Toronto. It’s not what he wanted to do but, for the lack of any choice, is what he was forced to do. Reza, 54, was born and raised in Mashad, Iran. In 1981, he went to India to study Economics at Bhopal University (now known as Barkatullah University Bhopal). He completed his PhD in 1988 after which he came to Canada and applied for refugee status. But in Canada, his dream fizzled.Tejpal BathDays after graduation, Tejpal Bath was offered his dream job: living in a village and caring for cows, buffalo and horses. Bath, 35, was a veterinarian in northern India. In Canada, he drives a cab. Bath studied Veterinarian Sciences at Punjab Agricultural University in northern India, graduating in 1997 after five gruelling years. The work was satisfying. But in 2001, he visited his brother in Toronto and met some old friends. He returned home, opened a small animal clinic and applied for immigration at the same time. The clinic was doing well, but he and his wife decided to give Canada a try. They and their son, now nine, moved there in 2006. He took the first qualifying test for a veterinarian licence but didn’t pass. He drove a truck for a while. But it kept him away from his family so, two years ago, he decided to drive a cab.Chamkaur Singh DhaliwalAt 36, Chamkaur Singh Dhaliwal was the youngest professor of Agricultural Entomology at a university in northern India. About 17 years later, he is one of dozens of cabbies waiting for fares at Pearson airport. Dhaliwal joined as an assistant professor in the Department of Entomology at Punjab Agricultural University in Ludhiana, India, in 1980, becoming professor in 1996. It was a good life and Dhaliwal and his wife, Savinder, a school principal, were content. Two weeks after the family landed in Toronto, Dhaliwal went to the University of Guelph. His PhD was recognised, but he couldn’t find work. He opted to become a real estate agent. That went well until the market downslided. With a family to support and a mortgage to pay, Dhaliwal decided to drive a cab.Are these claims true about Canada? And to what extent?

BECOME A PHARMACISTPharmacy students are the lifeblood of our profession! If you’re considering a career in pharmacy, here’s what you need to know.Academic preparationIt takes at least five years of university education to become a pharmacist: one or two years of an undergraduate program (with some science courses required), followed by a four-year professional degree pharmacy program.The four-year degree program focuses on developing therapeutic knowledge and clinical skills. It includes rigorous education in physiology, microbiology, pathophysiology, clinical biochemistry, pharmacology, toxicology, and pharmaceutical care.Many pharmacists undertake additional post-graduate training. This may take the form of:a one-year residency program in a hospital or community practice settinga one-year residency program in the pharmaceutical industrypostgraduate courses leading to a Masters in Pharmacy and Doctor of Pharmacy degreescertification for disease states such as diabetes or asthmacontinuing education in an area of specialization such as geriatrics or menopause.Once you graduate from a university program, you must meet the licensing requirements of the Ontario College of Pharmacists to become a practising pharmacist. These include a structured practical training component and successful completion of a national examination by the Pharmacy Examining Board of Canada.Career opportunitiesPharmacists practise in a wide range of settings, including:at a community pharmacyin a hospital pharmacyin the pharmaceutical industryas long-term care consultantson a family health teamas teachersin a government or regulatory settingat a professional associationas researchersin businessin the Armed Forces.For more information on these roles, download our brochure, Pharmacy Career Opportunities.Employment rewardsPharmacy is a people-oriented profession. The primary rewards come from helping people with healthcare needs and from interacting with other healthcare professionals.Learn moreGet more information on the profession:Ontario College of PharmacistsPharmacy programs in Ontario:University of Toronto International Graduate Pharmacy Program at Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Toronto University of WaterlooPharmacy programs in other provinces:Dalhousie University Memorial University of Newfoundland University of Alberta University of British Columbia Université Laval University of Manitoba Université de Montréal University of Saskatchewan

No, not at all. Canadian universities are generally public universities and therefore standards are maintained across the board. They also cost less to attend. The only American universities that could conceivably be judged as significantly better are the very expensive ivy-league universities in the States.That being said, American universities tend to much more market-driven and revolve a lot more around recreational pursuits and sports (including sports scholarships) so if that's your idea of "better" then that's where you'd want to attend. However, I've been reading some rather disturbing info. about the lax standards at some of them so make sure you are attending one with a great academic reputation because school can't all be about partying. Please take a look at some of the documentaries out there about the problem...P.S. I found an interesting article written by Ren Thomas. I agree with him, in Canada you pick your school according to the best program, not according to the best school. Ex. if you want to go into nursing, you research the best nursing programs in Canada.Ren ThomasM.A., Ph.D. (Planning)Does Canada have an Ivy League?There is a lot of debate out there about whether or not there are schools in Canada equivalent to the American Ivy League (Brown, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Harvard, Princeton, University of Pennsylvania, and Yale). I’m not sure why this is so important for people to know, but I do know that as a potential applicant for teaching positions at US universities, an Ivy-League education is considered the best. Even in Canada, loyalty to the old prestigious universities is not in the least diminished by Maclean’s annual rankings.As a Canadian, I don’t know anyone who did an undergraduate degree at an Ivy League school, so my first introduction to the concept was when my classmates in landscape architecture began applying for masters programs over a decade ago. Inevitably, they chose to apply to American Ivy League schools like Harvard and Cornell. Interestingly, their main reason was that “all the famous landscape architects went there.” (not surprising: Harvard was the first landscape architecture program in North America and the only one for many years). Having visited the Graduate School of Design and seen their students’ work around this time, we were surprised to find that our work was quite comparable to theirs; in some cases, better. One friend, who applied to and finished a Harvard Masters in Planning, said that the main advantage of the school was the alumni network, which would ensure he could find jobs anywhere. The Harvard degree also exposed him to very prominent experts and guest lecturers. Even more interesting, he is now living and working with many of our former classmates who did not invest in Ivy League educations. The same applies to a couple of our classmates who attended Cornell for the Masters in Architecture, and now work at architecture firms with others with “less prestigious” degrees.The thing is, Canadians know about the American Ivy League, but we don’t really get it. I mean, we get that they’re prestigious and expensive and old. But we’re hampered by the fact that universities in Canada are virtually all public institutions, and there are few expensive, elite blue-blood institutions in the country aside from elementary and secondary schools like Branksome Hall and Ashbury College. According to theCanadian Information Centre for International Credentials, there are 94 universities in Canada (83 with degree-granting status) belonging to the Association of Universities and Colleges in Canada. There are 27 private colleges, the vast majority being theological schools: when you take these out, there are only 6 left. Tuition costs at Canadian schools are much cheaper than American schools, although generally the older, larger schools cost a bit more and since tuition deregulation in the 1990s the professional programs can charge more than the standard tuition. They can also offer more funding, so it evens out: even Statistics Canada found that there has been little decrease in the proportion of lower-income students attending university now than before tuitions began their rapid ascent in the 1990s. So the Ivy League is a tradition we simply do not have here. Ditto those other prestigious American schools that are supposed to impress us. American students enrolled at Canadian schools often find their introductory conversations go a bit like this:Canadian: So you’re from Pennsylvania?American: Yes. I went to XXX School. (pause for reaction)Canadian: Oh yeah? (blank stare)American: (confused) It’s a really good school.Canadian: Ohhhh. (realizing the faux pas in not knowing the names and reputations of all 45670 American schools) Well that’s great. (unimpressed)That’s right, I said it: we don’t know your schools the way you don’t know our prime ministers. Or our provinces. Or our capital.That said, the four universities that many consider to be the “Canadian Ivys” are the University of Toronto, McGill University, Queens University, and the University of British Columbia. The only logic to this seems to be that they are old and therefore have ivy-covered buildings! These schools, because of their age, have extensive and well-known alumni who teach, do research, win Nobel Prizes and Fields Medals, and otherwise propagate the mythology of their being better schools than the rest. There is also something called the Group of Thirteen, which includes the above-mentioned schools plus the University of Alberta, University of Calgary, Dalhousie University, Université Laval, MacMaster University, Université Montréal, University of Ottawa, University of Waterloo, and University of Western Ontario. These schools meet informally twice a year to discuss joint research initiatives and between them hold 66% of Canada Research Chairs, which is proportional to the amount of research funding they bring in from SSHRC, NSERC, and CIHR. And if I’m going to be honest, these schools probably get more famous guest lecturers.But the Maclean’s rankings show a very different story: each school has very different strengths. The magazine divides Canadian universities into three categories: primarily undergraduate, comprehensive undergraduate, and medical doctoral universities. The schools are evaluated on a range of characteristics, including spending on student services and scholarships and bursaries, funding for libraries, faculty success in obtaining national research grants, and their reputation for being innovative. The top-ranked primarily undergraduate schools are Mount Allison and University of Northern British Columbia. The top-ranked comprehensive undergraduate schools are Simon Fraser and University of Victoria. And the top-ranked medical doctoral schools are McGill, Queens and Toronto. Some schools have highly-ranked business or teaching programs, others are strong in medicine or law. Indeed, some of these professional programs are known in their individual fields as “the best.” Some have a small student-to-teacher ratio, others have better resources or funding. And then there are the student favourites, typically small schools with a friendly atmosphere in a beautiful location, like Mount Allison.I attended two of the supposed “Canadian Ivys”: University of Toronto and University of British Columbia. I know only a handful of people at either of these universities who attended a private school before entering these seemingly august institutions (ie., these aren’t the elites of society). I don’t believe that these schools have better students, better teaching, or better facilities than other schools in the country: in some cases, Maclean’s shows they fail in all three areas. Graduates of these schools don’t seem to conduct themselves any differently, have access to better alumni networks, or get better jobs than graduates of other schools. While working as a landscape architect in England, for example, I ran into graduates from the universities of Guelph and Waterloo who were working for British municipalities; in Ottawa I met many government employees who were graduates of Université Laval, Carleton University, and the University of New Brunswick. I have yet to meet a Canadian who was impressed by the schools I attended, nor have I encountered any innate sense of superiority among graduates of these schools. Yet when I attend conferences, I frequently find myself having this conversation:American: Oh, you’re at UBC?Me: Yes.American: Oh, that’s a really good school. (impressed)Me: Is it? (seemingly amused, but actually quite curious)American: (confused) Well, yes.Me: Why would you say that?American: (stumped) I…hmm. (because I’ve heard of it)The relatively level playing field among Canadian universities is probably one reason why Canada has the largest proportion of university graduates among G7 countries and the highest percentage of university graduates in the workforce. Immigrants in Canada have particularly high levels of university attendance: 37% compared to 22% of the Canadian-born population. Among recent immigrants (those who entered the country less than two years ago) 48% of females and 56% of males had a university degree according to the 2006 Census. Women have outpaced men in university attendance since the late 1970s, and more lower-income people are attending university in Canada than ever before. These types of changes have led to much more diversity in Canadian universities. And there is considerable evidence that nurture, as opposed to nature, is the key to success in education: Malcolm Gladwell vividly illustrates this in Outliers.With only a handful (15) universities in Maclean’s medical doctoral category, Canadians often seek jobs in other countries; this is particularly true in academia. But we know that we will be judged by the school we went to, because that seems to be a common trend in the American university hiring process. A glance at the faculty directories of an Ivy League school reveals that virtually all of their faculty did their doctorate or post-doctorate work at an Ivy League school. Lou Marinoff, in a recent article in Inside Higher Ed outlined how his philosophy department, in City College at the City University of New York, narrowed down their search for a new faculty member from 627 applicants to 27 long-listed and 6 short-listed ones. A major criteria in the first step was holding a degree from “a good university.” As Marinoff writes, “Members of our department earned their Ph.D.s at Columbia, Harvard, Oxford, and University of London. Additionally, City College is known as the “Harvard of the Proletariat,” with distinguished alumni that include nine Nobel Laureates, more than any other public institution in America. Our faculty members are expected to live up to this legacy.” Of course publications, research, teaching, administrative service were up there too.I would love to say that this kind of academic snobbery does not exist in Canada, but it is pretty standard here to imitate Americans. Most of my friends in design professions hold Ivy League degrees in higher regard, and since my era at U of T’s School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture, the school has been completely rebranded with graduates of Yale, Princeton and Harvard. Many Canadian faculty members are American, or educated in the US, and bring these ideas with them. I can definitely say that the “reputation” of the school seems to play a role in the admissions process at SCARP. The ridiculous thing about this is that our school (which is a graduate program only) accepts applications from undergraduates in any discipline. And according to Maclean’s, as well as my own experience, programs vary considerably from school to school. So using school “reputations” makes no sense: you would have to be a master of every undergraduate program in the country to know what a “good school” was for that particular program. It’s one thing for a medical school to compare B.Sc students from everywhere, or engineering programs to compare their B.Eng applicants; it’s quite another for a multidisciplinary program which draws its students from programs as diverse as Forestry, French, Geography, Architecture, and Canadian Studies. It’s part of the reason why our school uses such a complex application process, evaluating transcripts, a research statement, reference letters, and work experience equally.Interestingly, Marinoff’s philosophy department invited 6 candidates to their school for interviews. Here is his summary of their performance: “All the finalists were impeccably well versed in their subjects matter, but not all succeeded in establishing rapport with the students. One lectured remotely, as if from afar; another failed to engage them in dialogue; a third took insufficient account of whether the class was grasping the material. Some lectured clearly and evocatively, encouraged and fielded questions on the fly, bridged gaps in students’ understanding by providing additional context where necessary, and covered the material in the allotted time. The best finalists attracted a throng of students after the lecture, having whetted appetites for further learning. The top two bundled humor with their lectures or slides, which palpably enhanced the ambiance and helped establish rapport. “Edutainment” is an American neologism, after all.”When it comes right down to it, these candidates (CCNY hired the top two) succeeded not because of their Ivy League pedigrees, but because of their ability to engage students and cope with the classroom setting most effectively. Now, whether they gained these credentials as a result of their “superior” educations is a matter for debate: they were likely supported and mentored more than students at other schools, because their high tuition costs resulted in more resources (again, Outliers is relevant). I suspect these outstanding candidates worked hard at developing their skills and lecturing style, and had a real passion for teaching. Preferential selection of candidates based on their school’s reputations was really just a useful filter in this case, a way of decreasing the number of applicants to consider carefully, albeit one that probably eliminated many worthy candidates from lower income and minority backgrounds who couldn’t afford Ivy League educations.All this to say that I don’t believe there is a Canadian Ivy League, nor do I think we need one. It’s too bad that universities, professors, and students can’t get over these ideas of being “the best”, or producing the “best and the brightest” students. This relentless competition is even seen in what Richard Moll, in his 1985 book, called the “public Ivys”, eight American schools that were “successfully competing with the Ivy League schools in academic rigor… attracting superstar faculty and in competing for the best and brightest students of all races.” It’s even worse that the myth of the Canadian Ivy League is being relentlessly perpetuated by recruiters who travel all over the world with glossy brochures featuring the old ivy-clad buildings (international student tuitions are higher than those for Canadian citizens, so the schools encourage it). But the Canadian reality is a bit different, and there really is no reason a University of Alberta grad and a McGill grad should not be considered equally.