Indirect Pathways Into Practice: Philippine Internationally Educated Nurses and Their Entry Into Ontario’s Nursing Profession

Social connectedness to social support systems and communities highly affect the transitioning success of Philippine Internationally Educated Nurses (IENs). These networks are especially critical during the first year upon arrival. The fragmented, indirect pathways to professional practice, (including barriers to foreign credential recognition, lengthy and costly examination, licensing and retraining result in direct devaluation of IENs and the possibility of permanent (de)skilling. Female IENs endured more financial and emotional hardship, compared to their male counterparts, with regard to family obligations and deeper financial burden. While many of the male IENs experienced the same challenges as women, the latter experienced longer unemployment as they stayed home to take care of children, while their husbands found work first. More research on gendered discrepancies among IENs is recommended

Migrating professional knowledge: progressions, regressions, and dislocations

Drawing on practice-based learning theory, this chapter examines issues pertaining to the deskilling of immigrant professionals in Canada. It argues that adult educators need to have an awareness of transnational migration dynamics and work in meaningful ways to keep immigrant professionals connected to professional knowledge practices

The disjuncture of learning and recognition: credential assessment from the standpoint of Chinese immigrant engineers in Canada

To better recognise foreign qualifications, many OECD countries have promoted liberal fairness epitomised by universal standards and institutional efficiency. This paper departs from such a managerial orientation towards recognition. Building on recognitive justice, it proposes an alternative anchoring point for recognition practices: the standpoint or everyday experiences of immigrants. This approach is illustrated with a qualitative study of the credential recognition practices of the engineering profession in Canada. From the standpoint of Chinese immigrants, the study identifies a disjuncture between credential recognition practices and immigrants’ career stage post-migration. Taking this disjuncture as problematic, it further pinpoints recognition issues such as redundancy and arbitrariness, a narrow focus on undergraduate education, and a deficit view of training from other countries. While some of these issues may be addressed by improving administrative procedures, others demand a participatory space allowing immigrants to become partners of assessment, rather than merely its objects. (DIPF/Orig.

The Evaluation of Immigrants' Credentials: The Roles of Accreditation, Immigrant Race, and Evaluator Biases

Theories of subtle prejudice imply that personnel decision makers might inadvertently discriminate against immigrant employees, in particular immigrant employees form racial minority groups. The argument is that the ambiguities that are associated with immigrant status (e.g., quality of foreign credentials) release latent biases against minorities. Hence, upon removal of these ambiguities (e.g., recognition of foreign credentials as equivalent to local credentials), discrimination against immigrant employees from minority groups should no longer occur. Experimental research largely confirmed these arguments, showing that participants evaluated the credentials of black immigrant employees less favorably only when the participants harbored latent racial biases and the foreign credentials of the applicants had not been accredited. The results suggest the importance of the official recognition of foreign credentials for the fair treatment of immigrant employees.Labour Discrimination, Immigrants, Racial Minorities, Prejudice, Credential Recognition, Experiment

Never Good Enough: Health Care Workers and the False Promise of Job Training

[Excerpt] I have drawn on several qualitative research projects to compose an account of what the training and education industry for allied health care workers is, and what political (perhaps even ethical) dilemmas it poses. The evidence in the book is drawn from several research projects in which I was involved from 1999 to 2003, each of which examined work in health care, life in the sub-baccalaureate labor market, and the genesis and significance of a health care workforce training industry, albeit from different angles. First was a study of occupational change in three subacute care facilities (essentially a level of care between that of an acute care unit and a nursing home), with the aim of identifying where workers might need training. Second was an evaluation of a communication skills training program at a midsize teaching hospital in the center of one of the city\u27s poorest neighborhoods. The third study focused directly on individual workers and the emergence of the industry to train them, for which I conducted in-depth interviews and observed several sessions of two additional training seminars—a customer service training program at a public hospital and an in-service on communication at one of the city\u27s largest home health care agencies

Argentina's labor markets in an era of adjustment

The current economic crisis in Argentina is only partly the result of inappropriate domestic policies to cope with the recent external shocks. Years of inappropriate policies have damaged Argentina's economy. Even if no external shocks had occurred, the country would still have to change the structure of production. Argentina has had trouble sustaining a program of structural adjustment. Its experiences provide policymakers with some lessons in designing a sustainable program to achieve price stability and change the incentive system : a) macroeconomic and trade policies must be consistent; b) labor relations and labor market institutions must be changed including the decentralization of wage bargaining and the elimination of traditional wage policies and general government intervention; c) rigidities and restrictions on labor mobility must be eliminated, leading to less pervasive government intervention in the form of restrictive regulations and spending patterns; and d) public spending must be profoundly changed to reduce social costs during the transition period.Economic Stabilization,Banks&Banking Reform,Municipal Financial Management,Environmental Economics&Policies,Economic Theory&Research

Mainland Chinese students at an elite Hong Kong university: habitus–field disjuncture in a transborder context

Drawing on in-depth interview data from 31 mainland Chinese (MLC) students in a Hong Kong university, this article conceptualises MLC and Hong Kong higher education as two dissonant but interrelated subfields of the Chinese higher education field. The article argues that these MLC students’ habitus, one that possesses rich economic, social and cultural capital, prompts a strong sense of entitlement to anticipated privileges. However, this sense of entitlement is disrupted by the differential capital valuations across these fields. There is thus notable habitus–field disjuncture, which, exacerbated by the hysteresis effect, gives rise to a sense of disappointment and ambivalence. This article demonstrates how the Hong Kong education credential, which these students initially set out to pursue as a form of capital, can become a disadvantage at multiple levels; the article illustrates that capital valuation and conversion in a transborder context is not a straightforward, but rather a complicated and sometimes contradictory, process

Discrimination at Work: Comparing the Experiences of Foreign-trained and Locally-trained Engineers in Canada

This paper reports on the findings of a study of the experiences of discrimination faced by internationally- trained engineers in Canada. Three hundred foreign-trained and two hundred locally trained engineers were surveyed in order to identify the relationship of race, language proficiency, and location of training in finding work in the engineering field. In addition to measuring whether the applicants found work in the engineering field, this paper also sought to understand the perception of discrimination of internationally-trained engineers. Our findings demonstrate the relationship of race/ethnicity and its related marker—foreign training—with both ability to secure work in the engineering field and perceptions of discrimination. In the case of new immigrants, location of training was found to be a significant predictor of ability to find work in the engineering field, where locally-trained engineers were far more likely to acquire a job in the engineering field than foreign-trained engineers. Race/ethnicity was also found to be significantly associated with getting an engineering job among the locally-trained engineers

Preparedness, Career Advancement, and the Glass Ceiling

Glass Ceiling ReportGlassCeilingBackground15Preparedness.pdf: 4582 downloads, before Oct. 1, 2020

Rethinking higher education and its relationship with social inequalities: Past knowledge, present state and future potential

The purposes and impact of higher education on the economy and the broader society have been transformed through time in various ways. Higher education institutional and policy dynamics differ across time, but also between countries and political regimes and therefore context cannot be neglected. This article reviews the purpose of higher education and its institutional characteristics juxtaposing two, allegedly rival, conceptual frameworks; the instrumental and the intrinsic one. Various pedagogical traditions are critically reviewed and used as examples, which can potentially inform today’s policy making. Since, higher education cannot be seen as detached from all other lower levels of education appropriate conceptual links are offered throughout this article. Its significance lies on the organic synthesis of literature across social science, suggesting ways of going forward based on the traditions that already exist but seem underutilized so far because of overdependence in market-driven practices. This offers a new insight on how theories can inform policy making, through conceptual “bridging” and reconciliation. The debate on the purpose of higher education is placed under the context of the most recent developments of increasing social inequalities in the western world and its relation to the mass model of higher education and the relevant policy decisions for a continuous increase in participation. This article suggests that the current policy focus on labor market driven policies in higher education have led to an ever growing competition transforming this social institution to an ordinary market-place, where attainment and degrees are seen as a currency that can be converted to a labour market value. Education has become an instrument for economic progress moving away from its original role to provide context for human development. As a result, higher education becomes very expensive and even if policies are directed towards openness, in practice, just a few have the money to afford it. A shift toward a hybrid model, where the intrinsic purpose of higher education is equally acknowledged along with its instrumental purpose should be seen by policy makers as the way forward to create educational systems that are more inclusive and societies that are more knowledgeable and just