Not sure if I qualify for graduate CEC

[slonicsson]

Hi

I finished a Canadian university in 2006 then I took a year off and then did my honours degree at another canadian university. As the result of this decision I had only one year of post-graduate work permit. I worked full time for about 9 months. After that I managed to get enrolled in science Msc graduate program. Now I am a graduate research assistant and had 180 hours of lab teaching assistantship. I wonder if I qualify for CEC graduate stream now?
I talked to different organizations and they give different answers. I consulted with an immigration lawyer and she said that I should apply but call agents of CIC said that I do not qualify. I am really confused

 

[slonicsson]

I worked 9 months in NOC B

 

[jes_ON]

Was your 9 months (really need to know more about # of weeks and hours per week worked) full-time employment within the past 2 years? Do you have another 450 hours (est. of 12 weeks at 37.5 hours) to make up the other 3 months of your 1 year requirement?

 

[slonicsson]

Was your 9 months (really need to know more about # of weeks and hours per week worked) full-time employment within the past 2 years? Do you have another 450 hours (est. of 12 weeks at 37.5 hours) to make up the other 3 months of your 1 year requirement?

Hi, Thanks for replying to my questions.
my 9 months of work was 40 hours/week. It was a technical NOC B job in my area of study.
I will definitely have a year of work experience if you count my graduate research and teaching assistantships. The issue is that I am not if this part time experience will count toward one year experience for CEC.

Thank you!

 

[Essat]

Hi,
Jes_ON's question was whether the 9 months employment occurred in the past 2 years prior to the date that you intend to apply. Say you want to apply in June 2010, the 9 months of full-time experience should have occurred from June 2008 - June 2010.

And yes, the part-time experience will count towards your work experience, but you need to have the 9 months within two years preceding the date of the application. Suppose the 9 months qualify, note that you will also need 3 months full-time experience. You cannot simply generate 1,950 hours in less than 12 months.
Essat

 

[slonicsson]

Hi,
Jes_ON's question was whether the 9 months employment occurred in the past 2 years prior to the date that you intend to apply. Say you want to apply in June 2010, the 9 months of full-time experience should have occurred from June 2008 - June 2010.

And yes, the part-time experience will count towards your work experience, but you need to have the 9 months within two years preceding the date of the application. Suppose the 9 months qualify, note that you will also need 3 months full-time experience. You cannot simply generate 1,950 hours in less than 12 months.
Essat

Hi Essat

My 9 months full time experience was from August 2008-April 2009. After that I started graduate research and teaching assistantships in September 2009. I have generated 180 hours from teaching assistantships.
I do not have fixed amount of hours for my research. I do put fair large amount of time on it because it is the requirement to graduate. I do have a reasonable stiped which covers my cost.

 

[Essat]

Now, did you explain the research assistantship part to the CIC call agents? Because if you just said that you have the 9 months full-time experience + 180 hours from Sept 2009- present, then they were right to say that you do not qualify. Note that in your first post, you wrote that you are a graduate research assistant and has 180 hours of lab teaching assistantship. This doesn't bring out the hours worked under the research assistantship and so you need to clearly state the number of hours that you put in as an RA i.e. separate the RA from the TA. These are two different jobs (although they have the same NOC Code - NOC 4122 (Post-secondary Teaching and Research Assistants).

The way I see it now is that you need to prove that you work as a Research Assistant (offer letter from your supervisor or university, reference from your supervisor stating what you exactly do, how many hours you work, how long you've been working with him and how much s/he pays you). If you indeed worked as an RA and TA last year and filed taxes, you should have a T4 and T4A and a notice of assessment from CRA. Of course you will need the same documents for your TA job (the 180 hours)

Again, note that you need to show 12 months full-time experience or the equivalent (you can generate 1950 hours within 24 months preceding the date of application - the work experience can be part time and doesn't have to be continuous).
Essat

 

[slonicsson]

Now, did you explain the research assistantship part to the CIC call agents? Because if you just said that you have the 9 months full-time experience + 180 hours from Sept 2009- present, then they were right to say that you do not qualify. Note that in your first post, you wrote that you are a graduate research assistant and has 180 hours of lab teaching assistantship. This doesn't bring out the hours worked under the research assistantship and so you need to clearly state the number of hours that you put in as an RA i.e. separate the RA from the TA. These are two different jobs (although they have the same NOC Code - NOC 4122 (Post-secondary Teaching and Research Assistants).

The way I see it now is that you need to prove that you work as a Research Assistant (offer letter from your supervisor or university, reference from your supervisor stating what you exactly do, how many hours you work, how long you've been working with him and how much s/he pays you). If you indeed worked as an RA and TA last year and filed taxes, you should have a T4 and T4A and a notice of assessment from CRA. Of course you will need the same documents for your TA job (the 180 hours)

Again, note that you need to show 12 months full-time experience or the equivalent (you can generate 1950 hours within 24 months preceding the date of application - the work experience can be part time and doesn't have to be continuous).
Essat

Thanks Essat, You definitely cleared up a lot for me! I was not sure if graduate research work experience counts toward CEC because it does not have fixed amount of hours.
So even if I do not have fixed amount of work hours on my graduate research assistantship, I suppose, a letter from my supervisor is the sufficient proof my number of work hours ?