Developing clients' personal skills
The following strategies develop immigrants' and refugees' personal skills to reduce the stressors associated with integration into Canadian society:
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Orientation sessions
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Information and referrals
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Language assessment, referral and training
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Employment and career counselling, placement, skills upgrading and certification programs
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Community development
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Citizenship programs
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Multicultural programs, such as:
● Health services for newcomers and refugees
● Housing support programs
● Government benefits/income support programs
Reorienting health services
Settlement and social service providers working at the community level may need training to address the needs of clients from many diverse backgrounds. It is also important to acquire an understanding of the spectrum of services available for clients, including preventative care and treatment to recovery.
The following organizations provide this type of training:
- Hong Fook Mental Health Association in Scarborough, Ontario, routinely runs a workshop for community workers in the settlement services sector entitled The Journey to Promote Mental Health.
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The Ontario Council for Agencies Serving Immigrants (OCASI) provides a framework for mental health promotion to facilitate a more standardized level of service delivery for the settlement sector.
OCASI has also prepared this summary and tip sheet on mental health promotion guidelines for front line service providers.
Video: Partnerships between mainstream and ethno-specific agencies
With Baldev Mutta (CEO, Punjabi Community Health Services)
We are often working in our own silos. We have our own agencies, we have our own funding envelopes, we have our own expertise. And what happens within everyday work is that we tend to forget how do we support each other. And the support can be in terms of board recruitment. I often get other CEOs asking me: “Do you have a South Asian member who can be a board member?” So that could be a partnership. I think it's very important for both the ethno-specific agencies and the mainstream organizations to partner together. And I can give you one concrete example that mainstream organizations have a particular expertise in providing specialized services. So for example at PCHS, we do not have ACT programs. The ACT program is a very specialized program that is provided to severely mentally ill patients. When we have a Punjabi-speaking client that requires ACT services, we partner with other agencies to make a referral. They have the specialized programs. And when they have a client that speaks Punjabi that they think that they are unable to serve, they refer the person to us. So in that sense, I think it's a win-win situation. So I will strongly encourage everyone that we should all partner and learn from each other because at the end of the day, it's about the client receiving the services, it's not about the agency. It's about the client. Where can the client receive the best care possible?