Yelena Petrukhina: From Kazakhstan to Winnipeg

Yelena Petrukhina registered for the SOPA program in February 2018. Back in Kazakhstan she worked as an Internship Coordinator at a local university. She arrived in Winnipeg, MB in May 2018 and 3 months later she landed her dream job! Yulia Savchuk, Yelena’s JSS Facilitator: “Yelena was one of those dedicated SOPA participants that took…

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An Eye Opening Experience

Our story today of a client who found job before settling in Canada. Although, we take pride in our clients’s success, we know that mostly all that success comes from the professionalism of our clients and their desire to learn. The experience and hard skills are there, our role is to help and guide. We…

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From Pre-arrival to Post-arrival to Job

Mussarat Parveen always knew that Canada would be her destination country. She valued its diversity, organization and cultural values. Mussarat speaks many languages and was brought up around many cultures, so she knew she will be comfortable fitting in. Before arriving, Mussarat and her husband Javed found the SOPA program online. They felt that it…

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Job Ready Before Coming to Canada

The best thing about SOPA is that it offers its courses before arrival. It is, indeed, a great opportunity that newcomers can arrive prepared. It helps smooth their settlement, and fasten their job search by having Canadian resume and other job search tools ready in hand. So they will get no surprises once they arrive and can integrate earlier to the economy and to the area they settle in.

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8 questions with the SOPA Graduate

Update: In December 2017 Fahim found a job. We are very happy for Fahim and wish him all the very best in his first job in Canada. Fahim Al Faruqui is an Information and Technology Services Professional from Bangladesh. He has extensive experience working in IT field and arriving soon in Halifax. Fahim has just…

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Be Better Prepared for Your New Life with Next Stop Canada

On April 1st, 2016, the YMCA of Greater Toronto’s Immigrant Services launched their pre-arrival program Next Stop Canada. Funded by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), the program’s primary objective is to provide quality settlement services to new immigrants before they arrive in Canada. The staff at Next Stop Canada, being immigrants themselves, have firsthand…

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Being Prepared is Half Way to Success

“While researching for pre-arrival preparation resources I came across the Settlement Online Pre-Arrival program (SOPA). I was surprised that SOPA had a tailored course for Manitoba and it was absolutely free. I had an enjoyable experience with SOPA from the beginning. Registration process was simple and straightforward and within couple of days I got an…

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