However, former Ukrainian specialists now living in Canada have two points of view on this matter. Some believe that the main thing is to learn English to the level necessary to pass a job interview, because, they say, no one here cares about having a diploma. Others are confident that obtaining a local education multiplies the chances of finding a good job. Moreover, getting into a university is sometimes much easier than verifying one's previously obtained diploma. And the second point of view is prevalent.
NO COMPETITION MARATHON
As for getting into a higher education institution in Canada, indeed it is much easier: there is no competition marathon, entrance exams, or sleepless nights waiting for results, which we were used to in Kyiv or Lviv. In Canada, to become a student, you need to complete fairly simple formalities – pay tuition on time and fill out an application. Of course, there are certain requirements. For instance, to enter a university, you must take an English proficiency test – TOEFL; for a college, the language level requirement may be lower. But again, these exams are not entrance exams. They are taken before submitting the application. If you do not want to take a written test, you can enroll in special preparatory courses (which are also paid) offered at many colleges. After completing them, you can consider yourself a student.
Most immigrant students in Canada pursue the same profession they once had back home. I have met college students who had extensive practical and even teaching experience in the same specialty at Ukrainian higher education institutions. The only exceptions are those newcomers whose profession is, so to speak, not quite 'Canadian'. These are usually people in the humanities – philologists, artists, journalists, teachers.
Well, they have no choice but to change their specialty. And here arises an almost Hamlet-like question – which profession to choose (or not to choose) for the future? It is clear that a mistake at this most crucial stage can lead to great disappointment.
...In Simferopol, Maryna taught French at a secondary school. Later, after moving to Canada, she enrolled in private computer courses, because she had heard so many true stories about how easy it is to find a job with such education. But when she finished the courses, she came to the conclusion: her heart was not in this work at all.
‘I paid a lot of money for the tuition,’ she sighs, ‘and now I’m investing it in education again. This time I applied to a public college for nursing courses. It seems that this profession suits me better...’
IS IT EASY TO PULL A SLED UPHILL?
However, despite the apparent simplicity of admission, getting a diploma in Canada is not so easy. The higher education system here seems to be built according to well-known law of nature: only the strong survive. And in Ukraine? Admission to a higher education institution is not a guarantee of obtaining a solid document of higher education. Even those who sometimes fail a transfer exam have the opportunity to retake it. And even a third time... Well, Canadians are used to something different. For instance, if you fail a test, you pay again, take the course again, and retake the exam. Sometimes the situation resembles a vicious circle.
I have met students who studied in colleges for almost double the normal term. Meanwhile, the teaching system in Canada is also completely different from the Ukrainian one. It is not the teacher's job to 'explain' the subject to students. During the lecture, the professor mainly answers students' questions regarding the material they have studied (independently!). Moreover, the time allotted for a lecture is not an hour and a half but only forty-five minutes. Indeed, it is not enough to explain all the nuances of the subject. Perhaps that is why the curriculum of any course resembles a rapid marathon. In addition, students are very often tested during lectures – to check how they have absorbed the material. So, starting from this stage, the 'natural selection' takes place. Not everyone passes it. For instance, if at the beginning of a semester a group in a college has about thirty students, by the end their number is reduced by at least a quarter. And after final exams (at the end of each semester), there are even fewer students.
I was once told that out of six hundred students who entered a prestigious university in the province of Ontario, only eighteen graduated with diplomas.
‘To say that studying at a Canadian college is difficult is probably an understatement,’ complains Olga, who came from Ternopil. Then she explains: ‘Constant tests have completely exhausted my nervous system! Imagine: they give seven to ten pages printed in tiny letters, with fifty questions, each with five answers. In thirty to forty minutes, I have to read all this, understand it, and pick out the correct answer. Moreover, the questions are worded in such a way that even a Canadian would be confused. Not to mention us immigrants. So it turns out that I know the material, and quite well, but I can't understand the task. So during the test I get nervous, reread the questions two or three times, and when I look at the clock, my heart sinks: there are only a few minutes left, and I still haven't finished the first page. Is it hard to make a mistake in such a state?!’
Olga came to Canada two and a half years ago. By profession, she is a software engineer. She entered college in the same field. But after the first semester, she quit studying – she couldn't handle the workload and the ordeal of tests. And if you count them, during a semester (fourteen weeks), a student has to take about forty written tests, sometimes more. No wonder they say there is a whole science to taking them. Moreover, local students have been accustomed to them since childhood. Whereas many of our newly arrived compatriots, even highly qualified specialists with higher education, find it very hard to get used to them. However, not everyone.
Among my acquaintances there are those who graduated from a local higher educational institution, and with honors, and have already found a good prestigious job. By opening the corresponding page on the Internet, which lists all local universities and colleges, you can immediately notice that there are quite a lot of them. Among them, the lion's share falls on so-called private colleges. Tuition there is, as a rule, about five times more expensive than in public ones. For example, in a public college, one semester of study costs about a thousand dollars, in a private one – from five to nine thousand. But money, they say, is something that can be earned. And knowledge is a treasure, and this burden is not carried on the shoulders. In Canada, you can always take a loan for any education – whether public or private.
The state, as we used to say, goes to meet everyone who wants to master a particular profession. The difference is only in the amount of debt that must be repaid as soon as you find a job. And as for the ultimate goal – receiving a Canadian diploma – the leadership belongs to private higher education institutions. They say that the requirements there are more lenient than in public ones: this, they say, is first of all business. And in business, as you know, the more clients, the greater the profit. Perhaps that is why even among those born in Canada, the opinion is widespread that when two people are hired for a job, preference is given to the holder of a public diploma. They say that a private institution is just a 'crust', but a public one is knowledge. However, probably many people will disagree with this point of view. And not without reason.
In Canada, there are enough immigrants who, after studying in a private college, quickly found a job in their field and even in a prestigious company. By the way, I have also met those who, with a public diploma, spent six months to a year looking for work. This is partly explained by the fact that work experience is of great importance for employment. Moreover, local Canadian experience. It is this experience, and not so much the presence of any diploma, that HR specialists, who are present in almost every serious company, pay enormous attention to. It is no wonder that most immigrants, especially those trying to get a Canadian education, primarily choose a higher educational institution that has a so-called 'co-op program'. In addition to studying, they require two semesters to work directly at an enterprise (sometimes they even pay money for it). The valuable experience gained provides a chance to get a permanent job. And a greater chance than from two to five years of exhausting study at the same institution.