The literature has reported that immigrants foreign credentials have been undervalued in Canada. However, the extent to which immigrants credentials attained in different world regions have been valued or undervalued is unclear. This study uses data from the 2002 Ethnic Diversity Survey to assess the worth of immigrants educational credentials in Canada, taking into account different fields of study. The major findings indicate that there were significant gross and net earnings disparities among immigrant men and women with educational credentials attained in different world regions. Foreign credentials from the US and Northern and Western Europe of immigrant men and those from the USA and all parts of Europe of immigrant women had an earnings advantage compared to immigrants whose credentials were from Canada. The results also suggest that immigrant men with foreign credentials in health fields and in commerce, management and business administration had the greatest difficulties to getting their foreign credentials recognized. Similar to immigrant men, foreign education of immigrant women in the fields of commerce, management and business administration as well as in natural, applied sciences and engineering was the most devaluated compared to women with Canadian credentials. In addition, both immigrant men and women with education from the USA and Northern and Western Europe irrespective of the field of study had the best chance to enjoy an earnings premium over their counterparts with Canadian education. The relationship between education and earnings among Canadian immigrants is further explained using a political economy perspective of racialization.

The literature has reported that immigrants foreign credentials have been undervalued in Canada. However, the extent to which immigrants credentials attained in different world regions have been valued or undervalued is unclear. This study uses data from the 2002 Ethnic Diversity Survey to assess the worth of immigrants educational credentials in Canada, taking into account different fields of study. The major findings indicate that there were significant gross and net earnings disparities among immigrant men and women with educational credentials attained in different world regions. Foreign credentials from the US and Northern and Western Europe of immigrant men and those from the USA and all parts of Europe of immigrant women had an earnings advantage compared to immigrants whose credentials were from Canada. The results also suggest that immigrant men with foreign credentials in health fields and in commerce, management and business administration had the greatest difficulties to getting their foreign credentials recognized. Similar to immigrant men, foreign education of immigrant women in the fields of commerce, management and business administration as well as in natural, applied sciences and engineering was the most devaluated compared to women with Canadian credentials. In addition, both immigrant men and women with education from the USA and Northern and Western Europe irrespective of the field of study had the best chance to enjoy an earnings premium over their counterparts with Canadian education. The relationship between education and earnings among Canadian immigrants is further explained using a political economy perspective of racialization.

The purpose of this study was to assess technology use, on-the-job technology training, education levels, and salary ranges of employees in low-, middle-, and high- skill jobs in a rural county in East Tennessee to create an example of a small town workforce. For this study, technology included computers, robotics, and mobile technology. A survey determined the technology used, training provided, salaries, and job skill levels based on education obtained and required by major employers. The study identified the level of jobs requiring more technology skills and salaries or training related to these job skill levels. Participants included 336 persons who completed an electronic survey. Participants represented twenty-eight different companies in healthcare, education, manufacturing, banking, and other small businesses in an East Tennessee rural county. The major findings of the study included: a) use of multiple forms of technology in all job skill levels; b) more time spent in on-the-job training for higher job skill levels; c) participants in lower job skill levels more likely to be overqualified for their position; d) participants in higher paying jobs used more types of technology; and e) participants in higher skill level jobs tend to have higher salaries. The study concluded that, while technology affected all skill levels, there was a significantly positive relationship between salary, technology use, technology training, and job skill level.

This dissertation interrogates the deficit assumptions about English proficiency of skilled immigrants who were recruited by Canadian governments between the late 1990s and early 2000s. Through the lens of literacy as social practice, the eighteen-month ethnographic qualitative research explores the sequential experiences of settlement and economic integration of seven well-educated Chinese immigrant professionals. The analytical framework is built on sociocultural approaches to literacy and learning, as well as the theories of discourses and language reproduction. Using multiple data sources (observations, conversational interviews, journal and diary entries, photographs, documents, and artifacts collected in everyday lives), I document many different ways that well-educated Chinese immigrants take advantage of their language and literacy skills in English across several social domains of home, school, job market, and workplace. Examining the trans-contextual patterning of the participants’ language and literacy activities reveals that immigrant professionals use literacy as assistance in seeking, negotiating, and taking hold of resources and opportunities within certain social settings. However, my data show that their language and literacy engagements might not always generate positive consequences for social networks, job opportunities, and upward economic mobility. Close analyses of processes and outcomes of the participants’ engagements across these discursive discourses make it very clear that the monolithic assumptions of the dominant language shape and reinforce structural barriers by constraining their social participation, decision making, and learning practice, and thereby make literacy’s consequences unpredictable. The deficit model of language proficiency serves the grounds for linguistic stereotypes and economic marginalization, which produces profoundly consequential effects on immigrants’ pathways as they strive for having access to resources and opportunities in the new society. My analyses illuminate the ways that language and literacy create the complex web of discursive spaces wherein institutional agendas and personal desires are intertwined and collide in complex ways that constitute conditions and processes of social and economic mobility of immigrant populations. Based on these analyses, I argue that immigrants’ successful integration into a host country is not about the mastery of the technical skills in the dominant language. Rather, it is largely about the recognition and acceptance of the value of their language use and literacy practice as they attempt to partake in the globalized new economy.

This dissertation interrogates the deficit assumptions about English proficiency of skilled immigrants who were recruited by Canadian governments between the late 1990s and early 2000s. Through the lens of literacy as social practice, the eighteen-month ethnographic qualitative research explores the sequential experiences of settlement and economic integration of seven well-educated Chinese immigrant professionals. The analytical framework is built on sociocultural approaches to literacy and learning, as well as the theories of discourses and language reproduction. Using multiple data sources (observations, conversational interviews, journal and diary entries, photographs, documents, and artifacts collected in everyday lives), I document many different ways that well-educated Chinese immigrants take advantage of their language and literacy skills in English across several social domains of home, school, job market, and workplace. Examining the trans-contextual patterning of the participants’ language and literacy activities reveals that immigrant professionals use literacy as assistance in seeking, negotiating, and taking hold of resources and opportunities within certain social settings. However, my data show that their language and literacy engagements might not always generate positive consequences for social networks, job opportunities, and upward economic mobility. Close analyses of processes and outcomes of the participants’ engagements across these discursive discourses make it very clear that the monolithic assumptions of the dominant language shape and reinforce structural barriers by constraining their social participation, decision making, and learning practice, and thereby make literacy’s consequences unpredictable. The deficit model of language proficiency serves the grounds for linguistic stereotypes and economic marginalization, which produces profoundly consequential effects on immigrants’ pathways as they strive for having access to resources and opportunities in the new society. My analyses illuminate the ways that language and literacy create the complex web of discursive spaces wherein institutional agendas and personal desires are intertwined and collide in complex ways that constitute conditions and processes of social and economic mobility of immigrant populations. Based on these analyses, I argue that immigrants’ successful integration into a host country is not about the mastery of the technical skills in the dominant language. Rather, it is largely about the recognition and acceptance of the value of their language use and literacy practice as they attempt to partake in the globalized new economy.