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Sandra Lourdes Murillo Paz moved to Edmonton from Mexico in 2010 to join her family, who had moved there a few years prior.

She received her citizenship this year and was most excited to vote. Voting is important to Sandra because it enables her to make her “new country better for everyone.”

She has already used her Canoo app to start exploring her city, including the Art Gallery of Alberta. She plans to use her VIA Rail discount and her Canoo app to explore more of Canada during the summer months.

Sandra volunteers, when she has time, in the arts and creative community in Edmonton. She believes that the Canoo program is important because it allows new Canadian citizens to explore arts and culture in Canada. “It helps me to understand the importance of arts and cultural diversity, and promotes knowledge about who we are [as a country],” she says.

I have always considered my nationality a form of identity and I sought to better understand this identity when I left the shores of Nigeria to pursue a new career and educational prospects. I wanted to learn and experience a world beyond the one I was familiar with. That experience has been a journey in self-discovery; I did not realize how Nigerian I was until I moved to Canada. My cultural idiosyncrasies as a Nigerian became points of exceptionalism in my new Canadian environment—the kind of exceptionalism that gives room to learning, unlearning, and re-learning the world around me.

I discovered a world beyond the confines of my singular view during my postgraduate studies. I was learning with other students from different nationalities who, like me, were attempting to make sense of the world vis-à-vis their new experiences. I soon discovered a diaspora community that was a rich blend of cultures and worldviews that were vastly different from mine. I was becoming more conscious of my unconscious biases and the nuances of my new cultural environment—a world far from the one I had left behind. My new experiences spoke to new possibilities—the kind one would only find in a world that appreciates and gives voice to the unique and multifaceted experiences of people of different backgrounds and worldviews.

Canada soon became my definition of a multicultural society and as I got involved with my community, I found my place as part of its cultural mosaic. My experiences did not come without challenges, however. I found that workforce engagement or social inclusion is often skewed in favour of those with more similar or familiar experiences. Different is not always considered valuable, and maintaining the status quo is sometimes favoured by those who would rather not make the effort to learn new ways of being, doing and seeing.

Through my work on The Inclusion Project—a platform for engaging private and public sector stakeholders on issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion—I’ve thought and learnt a lot about the correlation between a sense of belonging and one’s status on the citizenship spectrum. The project was inspired by some of the conversations at 6 Degrees Toronto, the forum presented by the Institute for Canadian Citizenship that I attended as part of my fellowship, as well as some international conversations around citizenship and migration.

Access to healthcare, employment, and some social services are sometimes allocated based on citizenship status. While there is a justifiable need to grant primary access to those who, by birth or naturalization, are citizens, this could also lead to the exclusion of those who do not (yet) have the privilege of citizenship. The illusion of permanence for immigrants, refugees or other newcomers becomes apparent when it becomes increasingly difficult to access much-needed services or the extent of their contribution to the society is limited by their residency status.

Certain rights (and privileges), such as the right to vote or run for office, should be reserved for citizens, but the growing need for skilled labour and the aging Canadian workforce no doubt, calls for new talent that would likely need to emerge from other parts of the world. Nova Scotia and Newfoundland have caught up to the need to support foreign medical talent to meet their needs; other provinces and professions need to catch up to this trend and consider new ways of gauging skills and experience beyond the number of years a person has spent in the country or their citizenship status.

For me, civic engagement and finding a sense of belonging in my local community goes beyond the parameters of a certificate and the accompanying privileges. I see citizenship as the everyday experience of contributing to my local community through responsible and active engagement. This, to me, is what it means to become Canadian.

Ruth Mojeed is a 2018–2019 ICC Fellow. For more information on the ICC Fellowship, visit https://www.icc-icc.ca/site/icc-fellowship.

Photo: Institute for Canadian Citizenship / Alyssa Faoro

By Ruth Mojeed

Joseph Lopez arrived in Canada in April of 2009 from New Zealand. He chose Canada because of its welcoming spirit towards immigrants. Joseph became a citizen on February 21, 2018. “My life has not really changed since coming to Canada – my dreams are still there,” says Joseph, “However, I am now proud to be Canadian and [am] feeling more at home.”

Joseph loves history, whether it’s reading about Canadian history or watching documentaries. Because of this, he used his Cultural Access Pass to explore Canada and its rich history. Joseph took advantage of his one-time 50% VIA Rail discount to take a trip from Vancouver to Winnipeg to Toronto and back to Saskatoon, then Vancouver. Along the way, he visited many museums and historic sites, including Fort Rodd Hill National Historic Site and Fort York National Historic Site.

“I have been using my Cultural Access Pass to visit museums, art galleries, [and] historic homes in Vancouver, Victoria, Winnipeg, Saskatoon, and Toronto,” tells Joseph, “Cultural places are important in acquiring your identity as a Canadian. Going to cultural places and spaces made me more attached to my new country. Knowledge makes you see Canada in a different way – it feels more like home. I value my Cultural Access Pass because it has helped me know more about my new country, Canada, [..] my home and native land!”

About CAP: For nearly 10 years, the Institute for Canadian Citizenship (ICC) has delivered the Cultural Access Pass (CAP), an innovative, best-in-class program that gives new citizens access to Canadian culture.

Be featured in our newsletter: Tag CAP and use the hashtag #CAPCanada in your social media posts for your chance to be the next CAP member or alumni featured, or send an email to cap@forcitizenship.ca

More than a week has passed since the horrific terror attack on two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand. During this time, many of us have been reflecting on that horrific event and searching for answers to the difficult questions it has raised. This is happening not just in New Zealand, but also here in Canada, where a similar attack occurred just over two years ago in Québec City.

We think of the victims and mourn with and for their families and friends. We think of the attacker and question what led him to commit mass murder. And we think of the different communities traumatized by this latest act of atrocity—Muslim communities, immigrant communities, and refugee communities, among others.

And after all of this thinking, we wonder what to do.

“We are one. They are us,” said the Rt. Hon. Jacinda Arden, Prime Minister of New Zealand, in a powerful statement of unity. In these six words, I believe we can find common cause and the building blocks of a call to action.

Inclusion and belonging are core tenets of the organization I now work with, the Institute for Canadian Citizenship. All of our work is rooted in a fundamental belief: Diversity is a reality. Inclusion a choice. This choice—this conscious decision to deny an “us and them” mentality in favour of seeing only “us”—is at the heart of what we believe Canadian citizenship to be.

Seventy-five times a year, we put this principle into practice, by producing citizenship ceremonies in co-operation with Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada—often referred to as “enhanced” citizenship ceremonies. In cities big and small, in schools, libraries, sports arenas, galleries, and other iconic spaces, we bring together Canadians and those just about to take their oaths of citizenship. We ask them about their journeys to citizenship. We invite them to tell their stories. We solicit their opinions on what citizenship means to them. And we ask the new citizens why they decided to join us—because becoming a Canadian citizen is, on their part, an active choice. Not everyone who comes to Canada takes out citizenship—many remain permanent residents—but the vast majority, 86 percent, do. Why? Why do the majority of newcomers to Canada choose to become one of us, often at the cost of giving up another citizenship?

Hope. Undeniably, that is the common factor. Hope for themselves. Hope for their children. Hope for their extended family. Hope that they may benefit from—and contribute to—a better society than the one they left.

This was the hope with which my parents brought me, my brother, and my sister to Canada. And it is the same hope that prevails amongst every new citizen I meet in my new role as CEO of the Institute for Canadian Citizenship. It is this hope that resonates with me and that fuels my commitment to fulfil the promise set out by the Rt. Hon. Adrienne Clarkson and John Ralston Saul when they established our organization in 2006.

So, what is my call to action? It’s simple: Join us. Whether as an individual or as a group—from your neighbourhood, your workplace, your religious community, or any other association—join us. Come to one of our 75 annual enhanced citizenship ceremonies. Celebrate with new Canadians who are just joining our family. Talk to each other and share your stories. In doing so, realize for yourself—as we are convinced you will—that there is more that unites us than divides us. And that inevitably, truisms and clichés aside, you too will choose inclusion.

Information on upcoming citizenship ceremonies can be found here: https://forcitizenship.ca/program/building-citizenship/

By Yasir Naqvi, CEO of the Institute for Canadian Citizenship

It is just a two-hour flight between Boston and Toronto, and yet I had never visited Canada until my kickoff as an Institute for Canadian Citizenship (ICC) Fellow this past September. Little did I know that this experience would not only impact my professional growth, but also change me personally, as I incorporated the more global perspective of the ICC into my work on youth civic engagement in the United States.

I was immediately drawn to the ICC’s mission to “inspire inclusion, create opportunities to connect, and encourage active citizenship.” After graduating from college in 2017, I transitioned into the post-graduate realm of working full time and thought that I needed to have everything figured out. At 23, I was eager to continue learning through the ICC Fellowship, which supports youth empowerment up to age 30. This young professional period is pivotal for experiential development and early career investment as participants gain experiences to ground their passions and identity. Furthermore, the ICC Fellowship provides peer to peer resources that challenged me to innovate and strengthen my leadership skills.

Through this Fellowship, I realized that the difference between college and the professional world is not about whether learning takes place, but rather that the environment in which you learn shifts: from the classroom to the community. Now, I am putting ideas into action rather than studying them in theory. I incorporate active citizenship through my job at Generation Citizen (GC) as the FAO Schwarz Fellow and Senior Program Associate.

It is in the intersection of real-world application and citizenship building that my ICC project sits—a true marriage of GC’s action civics approach with the Fellowship’s investment in youth-led community projects. GC defines action civics as “a student-centered approach in which young people learn about democracy by actively working to address issues in their own communities.”

My project utilizes a collaborative technology platform known as “Padlet” to connect middle and high school students engaging in GC’s civic projects to one another across Boston. In each class, students collectively identify an issue in their community that they want to work on, begin conducting comprehensive and experiential research to hone in on a root cause and develop a policy goal at the local level which they want to address. The second half of the curriculum provides them with the tools to implement an action plan to work towards their policy goal. Through peer collaboration via this project, students grow their skills in communication, teamwork, research, making calls to elected officials, op-ed writing, and more. Further, I am studying students’ use of technology to carry out their civic project, as well as soliciting feedback from a peer classroom on its impact on students’ overall civic efficacy or confidence in their skills. Even more important, I am measuring students’ understanding of coalitions and developing a better understanding of whether they see themselves as part of a movement of young people invested in changing their community rather than individuals operating on their own.

During pivotal stages of the curriculum, students post updates about their class project and then comment on their peer class’ project. This enables students to hear different perspectives and enhances the overall project quality. The skill of collaborative project planning is important as our world becomes increasingly global and technology is at the heart of how we communicate.

I designed my project with input from those most involved in, and impacted by, the work. For example, I worked one-on-one with a teacher to ensure the Padlet design and framework would enhance, rather than hinder, her current class structure and student communication. Without her input, the Padlet platform would be less accessible and may not serve the needs of her students.

Since this is a pilot for GC, I am excited for the measurement and evaluation aspects, where I will assess whether this collaborative technology created a larger sense of community for our students. This fits well with the ICC Fellowship’s emphasis on connecting people through technology, as students in our program step into their full power as youth leaders who can combat community obstacles through collaborative civic action.

A big thank you to the ICC for providing such an immersive and relevant opportunity for global youth to engage with one another in a shared space of curiosity. I have immense gratitude to my stellar group of peer fellows who I was able to deeply connect with at 6 Degrees Toronto this fall. Through the ICC Fellowship, I have magnified my capacity as a youth change agent and am excited to continue pushing the envelope on active citizenship and civic inquiry in Boston.

Samantha Perlman is a 2018–2019 ICC Fellow. For more information on the ICC Fellowship, visit https://forcitizenship.ca/icc-fellowship.

Photo: Institute for Canadian Citizenship / Alyssa Faoro

By Samantha Perlman

John Albin and Geraldine Arceo immigrated to Canada in November 2012 from Pampanga, Philippines. Their first goal was to settle down; establish a stable, happy family; and “make new friends.”

They became citizens on April 24, 2018. “Life became easier for us. We enjoy everything we do. We were given the chance to travel [easily with Canadian passports]. [We are] enjoying all the privileges and opportunities for a healthy future,” says Geraldine.

John and Geraldine love spending time outdoors with their family. “[We] live and enjoy healthy lifestyles,” says Geraldine, “We love camping, road tripping, and adventures.”

John and Geraldine are taking full advantage of their Cultural Access Passes—they have visited museums, national parks and provincial parks with their CAP cards. They also plan on traveling with their family before their CAP cards expire next month.

Geraldine remarks, “Becoming a Canadian citizen is like finding a new and better home.”