determination, and family/community support. The sky is the limit for those who dare to follow their dreams, regardless of whether you are chocolate or vanilla.
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The point is that there are always cracks in structural barriers of human society, and it takes the right and adequate resources to open them up for individual success. Many immigrants, refugees and international students enter Canada uninformed about the real barriers to their success in this country. The economic, political, social and cultural problems that these racial and cultural minorities encounter from Canadian institutions, organizations, communities and individuals overwhelm and break many of them. However, some of them break records in the face of the frustrations they encounter. What accounts for the success of the latter group of immigrants, refugees and international students in Canada? Using the secrets that facilitated the successes of these minorities as templates and also the observations on how the Canadian society and the education system operate, this book suggests strategic resources that would facilitate minority connections to Canadian mainstream institutions and organizations to win from the margins of society. Failure to connect strategically spells trapped socio-economic mobility and/or school dropout for minorities, and many minorities have fallen into this trap for lack of appropriate information and knowledge of the workings of Canadian society, relevant skills to confront these barriers as much as lack of adequate mentoring and support networks to help overcome the structural barriers.
Some immigrants, refugees and international students have effectively avoided or transcended the exclusion and assimilation traps to achieve remarkable successes in Canada by strategic connections to Canadian mainstream society and education system. This provides a solid foundation for the stance of this book that new immigrants, refugees and international students do not have to settle for underachievement despite the cultural and structural disadvantages they face in Canada. The strategic resources the book provides serve as an important conduit to help these racial and cultural minorities to productively connect with Canadian society and/or academia from the margins.
This book does not get into the theories of inequality, equity and diversity because new immigrants, refugees and international students are more interested in practical resources that would help them negotiate structural and cultural minefields of Canadian society and academia. The book, however, acknowledges the structural and cultural barriers to minority success in Canada. That is, it does not blame individual minorities for not making it in Canada. Organizationally the book is composed of two sections: 1) Connecting with Canadian society and 2) Connecting with Canadian academia.
Part I plunges into the contested issue of problematizing Canada as the best place on earth to live. Although Canada claims to be a multicultural country, the reality is that conventional rewards are located in the upper/middle class Anglo and Franco institutions and organizations of both the larger society and the standards of mainstream academia. These institutions and organizations tend to relegate racial and cultural minorities into the margins of Canadian society. Those minorities who successfully connect with the mainstream from the margins are those who get conventional rewards, thus winning from the margins. New entrants to Canada who remain isolated in the margins of the Canadian public sphere tend to experience low or no socio-economic mobility. Connecting from the margins is a process that requires strategic resources. Real life experiences of immigrants, refugees and international students supporting these claims form the basis of the discussions in Chapters One through Ten.
In Part II, it is argued that Canadian academia espouses standards, requirements and expectations that differ very much from those of the countries and communities that produce the greater majority of immigrants, refugees, international students, and indigenous people for Canada. Most immigrants, refugees and international students who enter the school system therefore experience academic culture shock. To succeed in the Canadian education system they need to overcome this culture shock to effectively connect with the Canadian academic culture. This academic culture projects the ideals of critical or analytical thinking, Greco-Roman logical reasoning and communication system, problem identification, and problem solving. This section proposes that in order to meet these academic cultural goals, immigrants, refugees and international students new to the education system need to acquire and apply the Canadian standards and expectations in the crucial areas of knowledge and skills such as structured listening, critical thinking and reading, academic writing, class participation, effective note taking/making, doing research and presentations, and taking examinations. Chapters Eleven through Twenty Five provide guides and tips for mastering these vital knowledge and skills that may help students to excel in the Canadian education system despite the fact that curriculum and pedagogy tend to marginalize their experiences and histories.
The concluding chapter tackles the controversial issue of connecting or integrating into Canadian mainstream society and academia without assimilating. It argues that until the multiculturalism and anti-racism projects eliminate monoculturalism and monostructuralism from Canada, strategic connections of minorities with mainstream institutions, organizations and communities from the margins would be the key to their success in Canadian society. That is, under these constraints minorities can only win from the margins. It is feasible for minorities to connect with the mainstream without being absorbed by it. Immigrants, refugees and international students can acquire the norms, knowledge, skills, standards, expectations, and images of the Canadian mainstream without giving up their ethnic-specific values, beliefs and identities. Some racial and cultural minorities have successfully done this.
There is hope for new immigrants, refugees and international students in Canada who want to succeed. They can successfully connect to the mainstream society and academia from the margins without assimilating.
PART I CONNECTING TO THE MAINSTREAM CANADIAN SOCIETY
Culture is made up of values, beliefs, norms, symbols, expectations, arts and crafts, technology, and other ways of life. Most immigrants, refugees and international students would have no trouble adapting to the Canadian ideal values because these are values that most freedom loving people cherish. These include fairness, tolerance, respect, honesty, accountability, integrity, openness, diversity, cooperation, democracy, equal opportunity, and civil and environmental responsibility. Although Christianity is the main belief system of Canada, the country has several other religions: Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, Judaism, and Animism. Many other Canadians are not affiliated with any conventional form of religion. Because of the operation of diversity of religions in Canadian society, new entrants to society, whatever their religions would find a place or community of worshipers. In the areas of dressing and technology, because of globalization (westernization?), many immigrants, refugees and international students easily adjust to Canadian standards. Perhaps the most difficult aspects of Canadian culture for new entrants, particularly adults, to adapt to are English/French expressions and accent, body language, jokes, and foods.
Generally, then, the adaptation of new immigrants, refugees and international students to the Canadian ideal culture should not be too hard. It would be inaccurate and naïve, however, to assume that mainstream Canadians apply these cultural elements in their real everyday lives. Rather, if you approach these cultural values and beliefs as just ideals towards which Canadians are continually aspiring, you will be less shocked when you encounter the entrenched and widespread instances of intolerance, disrespect, and/or injustice from people or institutions that you expected would epitomize these fine values and beliefs.
Canada Welcomes You
Each year, Canada welcomes people from over one hundred and fifty countries. All these people live together in harmony while pursuing their individual goals and sharing in the improvement of their local communities and the country as a whole.
