Exploring pathways to careers in migration and settlement
- Date
- June 16, 2020
- Time
- 2:30 PM EDT - 4:00 PM EDT
- Location
- Zoom - online
- Contact
- Michelle Nguyen, m14nguyen@torontomu.ca
This event is now being adapted to an online format. Please register to learn how you can participate.
This interactive workshop is designed for graduate and undergraduate students who are interested in networking, learning about, and planning careers in the field of migration and settlement. The workshop features a panel of professionals who are working in a range of areas, including government and policy, community building and education, and settlement services. The panel members will discuss how they arrived in their current role and will highlight their accomplishments, challenges, and lessons learned along the way. Following the panel discussion, there will be a moderated Q&A and small breakout sessions.
The workshop will provide students with ample ideas on potential career pathways to consider and introduce the skills, experiences and social networks that will help them to advance in their careers.
About our panelists
Gracia Dyer Jalea is a community organizer, fundraiser and the Founding Executive Director of the Toronto Ward Museum. She holds a BA in Cultural Studies and World Religions from McGill University, an MA in Media Studies from Concordia University, and recently completed a mini-MBA program at York University's Schulich School of Business. Her graduate work focused on participatory action research and critical pedagogy. While working at Concordia University, she co-authored Mapping Memories: Participatory Media, Place-Based Stories and Refugee Youth (Marquis Book Printing Inc., 2011). She received the June Callwood Award from Ontario's Ministry of Citizenship and Immigration in 2017, the Ontario Museum Association's Promising Leadership Award in 2018 and has been nominated for an Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants' Award of Excellence for her work on the Toronto Ward Museum.
Zaheer Dauwer has held positions with both the federal and provincial governments. Prior to his current role as Program Officer with Immigration, Refugee and Citizenship Canada, he worked as a Research Assistant in the Immigration Division of the Ministry of Children, Community and Social Services (MCCSS). Before joining the Federal Public Service, Zaheer worked as a Community Organizer and Interpreter offering services to government and non-government agencies involved in immigration and settlement of newcomers in Canada.
Zaheer holds an MA in Immigration and Settlement Studies and a BA in English literature. Zaheer is a first-generation immigrant, born and raised in Afghanistan. He lives with his wife and two children in Mississauga.
Lidia Jarmasz was an English-to-French translator and copy editor for several years before graduating from the Immigration and Settlement Studies (ISS) MA program at Ryerson University in 2018. She currently uses skills acquired in both the ISS MA program and her previous career in her work at the Refugee Sponsorship Training Program, where she trains, supports and shares information with Francophone private sponsoring groups across Canada. In addition, she volunteers with Matthew House’s Refugee Hearing Program, which helps refugee claimants prepare for their Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada hearing, and with the Stories of Us project, created by the Department of Imaginary Affairs, which develops innovative, English-as-a-second-language materials based on newcomers’ life stories.
Reem Ali is the Community Development Worker at the New Canadians Centre, leading projects that focus on the economic and social empowerment of newcomers. She also coordinates working groups under the Peterborough Immigration Partnership that focus on refugee and immigrant integration.
Reem has an MSc in Biochemistry from McMaster University and an MPA from Carleton University. She started her career in life sciences as a Researcher and Lecturer at Trent University. Her passion for international development led her to Egypt, where she spent six years specializing in the field of child rights and working with local and international organizations, most notably the Canadian International Development Agency, United Nations Children's Fund, and the Drosos Foundation. She continues to teach at Trent University in the International Development Studies department.
In 2018, Reem was a recipient of the Greater Peterborough Chamber of Commerce's ‘4 Under 40’ award and the inaugural Peterborough-Kawartha Women's Leadership Awards.