Interviews With Service Providers

A. Introduction

In order to obtain a balanced view of the seven Alberta communities to which refugees have been destined, we opted to interview a range of service providers in each city. Six closely related versions of a questionnaire were developed (see Appendix III B, Volume 3), for settlement workers, adult ESL teachers, K-12 teachers, health care providers, police officials, and for general community-wide agencies (e.g., United Way, Food Bank). We conducted a total of 72 interviews (11 in Fort McMurray and Medicine Hat, 10 in each of the other sites). All but one were face-to-face, usually at the interviewee's workplace. In nine instances more than one person from an agency participated; consequently, we have responses from 81 interviewees.

Methodology

Two interviewers were hired to conduct the bulk of the interviews, although in the early stages, two of the primary investigators conducted some interviews to test the questions. We attempted to develop a balanced set of interviews in each community, but we were unable to collect data from police in Fort McMurray and Grande Prairie; neither could we interview a health provider in Fort McMurray. In addition, our sampling was somewhat skewed in Edmonton and Calgary in that those communities have more settlement services; furthermore, the health and police interviewees in those centres came from units that specialize in multicultural issues.

All service provider interviews were audio-taped and transcribed by the interviewers into computer files. The shared questions on the six versions of the questionnaire were then sorted by community and by question to allow direct comparisons. We also sorted the questions unique to each type of respondent and grouped those by community as well. The responses provided by settlement workers were fairly detailed throughout, whereas some of the individuals from other agencies appeared to rely more on anecdotal evidence in some cases and they were unable to answer questions in others.

Background

We were most interested in issues around the size of community (smaller cities versus Calgary and Edmonton); factors in the individual communities that might affect refugee settlement; reasons for refugees staying or leaving a given community, and overall integration of refugees within each of the cities. To gain a picture of the similarities and differences across respondents, we collected some basic demographic information, which is found in Tables 1 to 3.

When asked what sorts of changes they had seen in their communities over the last 15 years, the respondents from Calgary, Edmonton, Lethbridge and Red Deer focussed primarily on the increase in immigration, particularly of visible minorities. Some participants from Medicine Hat also noted increased cultural diversity, but the main issue in that city was the aging population. Fort McMurray and Grande Prairie interviewees discussed the economic growth of their respective communities, but did not comment on immigration.

Settlement Connections

Across all settlement agencies, refugees tend to be assigned to a specific settlement worker (in the smaller centres there is often only one person to serve all immigrants); however, volunteer interpreters and other volunteers may also interact with the refugees.

In every community the respondents reported networking with other agencies in order to assist refugees, but in Calgary and Edmonton the networking was more structured, with interagency meetings, both among other settlement agencies and in conjunction with health care workers, police, private sponsors, etc. The settlement agencies in the two larger centres also reported contributing to policy issues at provincial and national levels. In the smaller centres, the contacts were informal and on a personal level (e.g., "The contact I have is through the church, through my friend who has worked with refugees in Fort McMurray for at least five years").

Although the settlement agency workers in all centres were aware of differences between refugees and immigrants, some of the service providers in other community agencies did not distinguish between the two groups. Among the settlement workers there was general agreement that refugees often have more health problems, both mental and physical, than immigrants. In addition, they have greater need of financial and psychological support, particularly in the first few months. Several people commented that one fundamental difference between immigrants and refugees is that immigrants made a choice to come to Canada, and have the option of returning home if things don't work out.

Table 1
Respondents' Number of Years with the Agency

Table 2
Percentage of Respondents Who had Experience with Refugees Prior to Current Position

Table 3
Respondents' Number of Years in the Community