Immigrants and new arrivals in Canada are quick to give back. We see in almost all our service provider organizations—I'll start there—that a number of successful graduates of their program come back, or new immigrants come back, and want to mentor and help those who have recently arrived.
In terms of formal mentoring programs and internship programs, I can speak about two that the government assists with.
One is called the federal internship program for newcomers. This is a program through which in Vancouver, Victoria, Toronto, and Ottawa we work with immigrant-serving organizations. They pre-screen or pre-select groups of immigrants who are caught in the conundrum of having trouble finding a job because they don't have Canadian work experience and not having Canadian work experience because they're having trouble finding a job.
How do you help bridge that to give them Canadian work experience?
It's a program that started with the federal government, and we've expanded it to include private sector partners as well. Candidates are pre-screened and selected. They come in. They do a short stage or period inside the federal government. A lot of them move out into the private sector. It has about a 60% success rate in terms of people finding permanent employment after the program. I can tell you from personal experience that those hired through this program are incredible candidates who really just need a chance to develop that Canadian work experience, and they can then go from there.
In terms of a mentorship program, Ms. Pateman, do you want to speak to that?