Marc Miller, Canada’s immigration minister, recently promised an increase in the integrity of international student programs.
The minister stated unequivocally that he is opposed to setting a quota on new foreign student intakes. However, to reduce international student fraud, the federal government is implementing a new program to check the Letters of Acceptance (LOA) required by prospective foreign students when applying for a study visa.
Furthermore, by the fall semester of 2024, the government will implement a new “Recognized Institutions Framework” for Canadian designated learning institutions (DLIs). DLIs are colleges, universities, and other educational institutions that have been recognized by their respective province and territory governments to accept overseas students. The framework will provide a better standard for foreign students’ services, support, and outcomes. The concept is that DLIs that fulfill specific IRCC integrity requirements would be eligible for benefits such as priority processing of study permit applications by IRCC.
Miller also stated that IRCC would perform its first assessment of the Post-Graduation Work Permit (PGWP) in ten years and that modifications would be revealed in the coming months. According to him, the objective is to calibrate the PGWP to solve Canada’s labor shortages in high-demand areas of the economy, as well as regional and Francophone immigration goals.
Canada is a popular foreign student location. It will welcome a record 551,405 foreign students from 184 countries in 2022. Another all-time high was 807,750 foreign students with valid Canadian study visas as of the end of 2022. Over the last 15 years, Canada’s foreign student population has doubled. This is due to reasons such as the growing global middle class choosing to study abroad, as well as Canada’s appeal to foreign students in areas such as educational quality, career opportunities, and immigration paths.
India (226,450 students), China (52,165 students), and the Philippines (23,280 students) will be the major source nations of new foreign students in 2022. Ontario (411,00 students) and British Columbia (164,000 students) were the most popular destinations.
According to Marc Miller, Canada will welcome around 900,000 international students in 2023. The Canadian government continues to provide numerous research permits. Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) awarded over 280,000 new study permits between January and June 2023, a 77% increase over the same time in 2022.
Today’s announcement follows the expulsion of over 700 Indian students in Canada earlier this year after the Canadian authorities revealed their LOAs to be false. Many of the students arrived in Canada to study in 2018 and 2019, and the scam was found after many of them had finished their courses and were applying for permanent residency.
According to reports, the LOAs were created by an unscrupulous immigration expert in India who has since vanished.
IRCC said at the time that overseas students who were not aware of or participating in the scam would not be deported. This incident brought to light the issue of Canadian foreign student fraud.
