Information Orillia Gets Trillium Grant for Survey
By John Swartz
Information Orillia announced this week an Ontario Trillium Foundation grant of $40,300 has been received to conduct a survey so it and other organizations can assess the needs of newcomers to the community. The survey should also reveal what services are missing or need improving.
“This is about determining what services are required specifically for newcomers,” said Information Orillia executive director Tammera Seyffer.
One of the most difficult things immigrants encounter is getting their professional and educational documents accepted in Canada.
“When we look at that we are looking at the foreign credentials program. It’s not an easy federal system to navigate and people may not have the tools they need to access it.”
Information Orillia already has some services in place for the community, but some may need modification for newcomers. The most obvious barrier is language, not just for day-to-day, but as with the program mentioned above, translation of documents becomes important.
“There’s initial services we can deliver now. The one-to-one support navigating system we can provide; to navigate the credential system to finding ESL classes, especially the legal transcription of documents – that’s the most mandatory to the foreign credentials program,” Seyffer said.
Information Orillia is just the group doing the survey, other social service organizations in Orillia will benefit from the results.
“One of the things is being able to provide this information to others. The survey results will be available to the other organizations so we can streamline our services accordingly.”
“Information Orillia has been involved in leading a community group for some time. It’s an organization that helps all of the non-profits stay together, communicate together. We meet periodically. You can see it on our website.
Interestingly, the project manager of the survey is Abdulaziz Khattak. He emigrated from Bahrain and has only been in Canada for 8 months. He is the editor of Oil and Gas News, which reports on energy sector issue in the Middle East, and since arriving in Orillia has become involved with Sustainable Orillia and Information Orillia.
Anyone can fill out the survey, which is online. Seyffer believes the work collecting the data and making sense of it will be completed by October.
(Photos by Swartz – SUNonline/Orillia) Main: Orillia Mayor Don McIsaac, Information Orillia executive director Tammera Seyffer and Simcoe North MPP Jill Dunlop at the announcement of the awarding of a Trillium grant.
