Federal Skilled Worker Requirements

The Federal Skilled Worker (FSW) category of permanent residence is geared toward foreign-skilled workers with experience in eligible occupations. Eligible skilled workers, based on their education, experience and occupation, may obtain permanent resident status in Canada. This category seeks to facilitate this transition while filling labour shortages that exist in the Canadian labour market.

In order to qualify, you must have:

• At least one year of continuous and paid (full-time or an equal amount in part-time) work experience
  • in a single occupation,
  • within the last 10 years,
  • At skill type 0, or skill levels A or B of the 2011 edition of the Canadian National Occupational Classification (NOC), and you:
    • Have this work experience in one of the eligible occupations, OR
    • have a valid offer of arranged employment, OR
    • are an international student who is enrolled in a Ph.D. program in Canada (or who graduated from a Canadian Ph.D. program within the past 12 months) and meet these criteria.

Beyond these requirements, you will be assessed based on a number of other selection factors, including:

• – Work Experience
• – Language Ability
• – Education
• – Age
• – Whether or not you have arranged employment
• – Your adaptability

Further, in order to qualify, your occupation must be on the most recent list of eligible occupations. This list is as follows:

• 0211 Engineering managers (Cap currently reached)
• 1112 Financial and investment analysts (Cap currently reached)
• 2113 Geoscientists and oceanographers
• 2131 Civil engineers
• 2132 Mechanical engineers
• 2134 Chemical engineers
• 2143 Mining engineers
• 2145 Petroleum engineers
• 2144 Geological engineers
• 2146 Aerospace engineers
• 2147 Computer engineers (except software engineers/designers) (Cap currently reached)
• 2154 Land surveyors
• 2174 Computer programmers and interactive media developers (Cap currently reached)
• 2243 Industrial instrument technicians and mechanics
• 2263 Inspectors in public and environmental health and occupational health and safety
• 3141 Audiologists and speech-language pathologists
• 3142 Physiotherapists
• 3143 Occupational Therapists
• 3211 Medical laboratory technologists
• 3212 Medical laboratory technicians and pathologists’ assistants
• 3214 Respiratory therapists, clinical perfusionists and cardiopulmonary technologists
• 3215 Medical Radiation Technologists
• 3216 Medical Sonographers
• 3217 Cardiology technologists and electrophysiological diagnostic technologists
• Lastly, due to the large number of applications CIC gets, they can only consider a limited number of applications per year. Between May 4, 2013, and April 30, 2014, CIC will consider no more than 5,000 complete FSW applications for processing. Within the 5,000 caps, they will consider no more than 300 applications per eligible occupation for processing within this same time frame.

This does not apply if you:

• Have a valid offer of arranged employment or
• are applying under the Ph.D. stream (there is a cap of 1,000 applications in this stream from May 4, 2013, to April 30, 2014).

Ensure you file your application as soon as possible.