The Editor,
I have mixed emotions about welcoming the thousands of Syrian refugees soon due to arrive on our shores.
On one hand, I wish to graciously return a favour granted to my family back in 1981, when Canada offered us such a warm welcome after we immigrated for similar reasons — in our case, to escape the oppressive climate of Cold War-era communism.
My misgivings, on the other hand, stem from Canada’s lack of federal and provincial funding to properly integrate these refugees into the community and prepare them for their lives as productive Canadian citizens, specifically through the means of relevant education programs.
As a person with a chronic mental illness seeking to become self-sufficient, I’ve experienced my share of hardship in the search for a decent career. From the outset, my quest for self-sufficiency has been fraught with impossible obstacles; namely, the catch-22 mechanism barring me from affording post-secondary education, not to mention a cognitive impairment and other symptomatology typical of my illness.
Through relentless research and seeking the advice of professionals, however, I devised my own personal road map to success, depending first on an institution called Coquitlam Learning Opportunities Centre. CLOC was the only institution where I could enrol in free high-school-level courses as a refresher in preparation for college after my 22-year hiatus from formal education.
Excitedly, I started at the Grade 12 level with math and physics courses, achieving high grades in each; afterwards, I eagerly looked forward to complete my high school refresher program with two similar courses. I would soon have qualified for the highly-anticipated Douglas College calculus I course I had been saving up for. Alas, last May, the minister of education annulled my road map to success by instating $500 tuition fees for some courses at this institution, citing reasons of “sustainability.”
If our education system cannot sustain the needs of current Canadian citizens seeking to become contributing members of the work force, how will we prepare 25,000 Syrian immigrants for their futures in our country?
Christy Clark, Justin Trudeau: This Syrian exodus is your cue to address the poverty conundrums in our province by invoking that long-awaited poverty-reduction plan, for our country’s false facade of wealth and prosperity is offering empty promises to those who long to escape oppression and tyranny.
With post-secondary education as inaccessible as it is today, especially for individuals suffering cognitive deficits and poverty, one fate is for certain: Thousands more will be either relying on Canadian welfare benefits or undergoing the tribulations of abject destitution.
Peter Toth, Port Coquitlam
