An Evening of Fun and Inspiration at the SOPA Alberta Social Café

The SOPA Alberta team was excited to host past SOPA clients living in Alberta for a lively evening of fun, networking and inspiration at the SOPA Social Café last July. The event took place at the main office of the Calgary Catholic Immigration Society (CCIS) and provided our program participants with an opportunity to meet…

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Anna Antropova: Newcomer Engineer in Canada

In this guest post, our client Anna Antropova talks about her SOPA experience and her journey as a newcomer engineer in Canada. Anna is an engineering professional from Russia who knew that preparation would make her transition smoother. She found SOPA and knew we would be able to help. She landed in Ontario in February…

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Information Makes All the Difference

An excited Philip Akpoesiri Mike-Ifeta moved to Edmonton, Canada, with his family on December 21st, 2017. In Nigeria, he had worked in the banking and financial services industry and had developed extensive experience in retail, small business, insurance, pension, asset management and customer service. His decision to move to Canada was stirred by a desire…

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Destination Canada: My SOPA Story

After just few months of waiting, we had our long-desired passport request email and we were advised by IRCC to go through with some pre-arrival sessions. Honestly, we attended sessions of few organizations, but SOPA was the best among all. SOPA has a very structured process, outstandingly helpful facilitators and amazing online resources.

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Arrive Prepared and Find Success

Every day the SOPA program helps professionals approved to come to Canada prepare for their job search and help them learn about Canadian workplace culture. In January 2017 a few months before coming to Canada Omotola Owoeye registered with the SOPA (Settlement Online Pre-Arrival) program and successfully completed the Job Search Strategies course. Job Search…

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Success Stories from Alberta

What is a success story? Finding job in your field soon after immigrating to Canada? Certainly, finding job after arriving in Canada is a huge success. However, at SOPA, we think that finding job, retaining your job and integrating into your new workplace are parts of your bigger success story in Canada.

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Four Thousand Miles – A Banking Professional’s Journey from Russia (Part 1)

Natalya is a highly experienced banking professional from Novosibirsk, Russia. She worked as an Account Manager in commercial banking for over six years. She was responsible for performing all kinds of banking operations with large companies in the region. Natalya considers herself a generalist which isn’t typical for the highly specialized Canadian job market. This…

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Ella’s First Job in Canada

It didn’t take long for Ella Oteze to gain employment after landing in Regina. Ella is an industrious and outgoing career Mathematician from Nigeria with over ten years of experience in the finance and banking field. This experience, paired with new skills developed with SOPA’s pre-arrival courses, provided her the confidence that led to her…

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First SOPA BC Graduate from China

Yue Xu is a professional translator from China who wanted to build her personal network in Canada. Her diverse experience includes translating for government bodies and companies. She took Professional Communication to get a better understanding of Canadian working culture and was an incredibly focused participant who was open to learning the concepts. “I find…

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