Trauma Informed Services for settlement sector staff is part two of a training series organized by Ontario Council Of Agencies Serving Immigrants (OCASI) in collaboration with The Canadian Center for Victims of Torture and Women’s Health In Women’s Hands Community Health Centre.

This workshop series aims to strengthen collaboration and partnership between newcomers and refugee serving organization.

The following topics will be covered:

• Understanding how to create a safe and welcoming environment from a Trauma Informed Perspective

• Understanding ways to involve program participants (aka clients/guests) in meaningful ways

• Increased knowledge of Best Practices around Burnout and Vicarious Trauma Support

• Increased awareness of tools to cope with Compassion Fatigue

Date: Monday, 10th December, 2018

Time: 9:00 a.m to 5 p.m

Location: 20 Grosvenor Street , Auditorium, 2nd Floor . Toronto

To register for this event or for more information, please click here

To help you navigate through the services for refugees across the sector, Refugee 613/Réfugié 613 in partnership with Ottawa For Refugees is organizing an information fair.

This fair will provide an opportunity for private sponsors to  meet with service providers from over 25 agencies.

What better way for private sponsors to network with community members, fellow private sponsors, and service providers.

Date: Tuesday, 4th December, 2018

Time: 6:00 p.m to 8:00 p.m

Location: Richelieu-Vanier Community Centre, 300 Des Pères-Blancs Avenue, Kiwanis Hall, Ottawa

For more information and to register, please click here

The interview with the Canadian visa offices (VO) abroad is a milestone in the private sponsorship process.

To help you ace this interview, the Refugee Sponsorship Training Program (RSTP) is organizing a webinar.

This webinar will walk you through the various steps by tackling the following topics:

• Drafting the claim and knowing the refugee

• How to prepare for the interview questions

• Tips on how to help refugees tell their stories during the interview

• Duties of the refugee

• What to expect in the interview

• Assistance that private sponsors can offer

• Reasons behind refusals

• Q&A

Date: Friday, November 30th, 2018

Time: 2:00 p.m to 4:00 p.m

To register, please click here

CBC - Khaled and Aveer Sultan and their six young children arrived at the Ottawa International Airport Tuesday to cheers, tears and hugs from their sponsors, who pinned tiny maple leaves to the newcomers' lapels. 

The sponsors will act as guides, translators and an extended family to the Sultans as they adapt to their new life in Brockville.

"This family is like my brother, like my family," said sponsor Omar Alahmed.

The five sponsor families have their own worries about relatives left behind in precarious circumstances, but say they decided to open their arms to strangers because of the way Canadians welcomed them. 

"Canadian people did not know me, but they helped me," said sponsor Ahmad Alkafrei, who arrived as a refugee in January 2017.

The sponsorship program the families are taking part in is administered by the Refugee Hub at the University of Ottawa and funded by two charitable groups, The Shapiro Foundation and The Giustra Foundation, as well as six other donors in Canada and the U.S.

Together, they're donating  $3.5 million dollars to 150 sponsor groups across the country to support the resettlement of 685 refugees, drawn from a list compiled by the United Nations.

Kailee Brennan, an outreach officer with the Refugee Hub, first met the families in August at a recruitment event in Brockville. They came hoping to bring their own relatives to Canada, Brennan said, but soon learned that's not how the program works.

"Of course, many of them had left family behind, and it's always so difficult to explain that." Brennan said.

After a prolonged discussion in Arabic, the translator, Brockville businessman Ahmad Khadra, declared the group had decided to open their arms to a family they didn't know.

"I told them, 'You are not a refugee anymore. You are now 100 per cent Canadian, and Canadians love to do something good,'" said Khadra, who came to Canada from Syria in 1995.

To read the full article, please click here