Express Entry Canada (Part 5): Canadian Experience Class

This article is the last in a five-part series which deep dives into the Express Entry Program for skilled workers. In Part 5, we do an overview of the requirements for the Canadian Experience Class.

An Overview of the Canadian Experience Class

The Canadian Experience Class Program (CEC) is for skilled workers with specific and relevant Canadian job experience who wish to become permanent residents. This program has similarities with both the Federal Skilled Workers Program and the Federal Skilled Trades Program in terms of the National Occupational Classification (NOC) groups.

CEC is perfect for foreigners working in Canada under a work permit, most of whom came to Canada as international students and were able to find jobs in Canada on a post-graduate work permit. After 1 year of full-time experience, most candidates qualify to apply through the Canadian Experience Class.

There are two advantages to the CEC over the other programs:

Canadian experience makes it much easier to be eligible
Applicants are not required to show proof of settlement funds, which are usually required under the Federal Skilled Workers Program and Federal Skilled Trades program.

Requirements

The minimum requirements include:

A high enough score on a language exam
In the last 3 years, 1 year of skilled and legal work experience in Canada
The work experience obtained was not through self employment or through a co-op term (these are not valid under this program)
General admissibility in Canada

There is no education requirement for the Canadian Experience Class but can help you improve your chances of being eligible. Any degrees or accreditation obtained outside Canada will need to be assessed through what’s called an Educational Credential Assessment (ECA). To find out more and select an organization on the designated list by Immigration Canada, head over to their website here.

Once you meet the program requirements under the Canadian Experience Class, you can submit an Express Entry profile through the online form available on the Government of Canada website.

If you think you may be eligible, head over here to see if you’re eligible for Visto’s free immigration platform.

Written by Josh Schachnow

Josh Schachnow is a Toronto-based immigration lawyer. After spending 4 years growing his own law firm and helping hundreds of immigrants and companies navigate Canadian immigration, he realized there was no technology to help make the process easy. So he started Visto, in an effort to automate all of the things he spent years doing manually – generating checklists, filling out forms, sending documents for signature, and more. He now spends most of his time talking to new clients, partners and working closely with the tech team to continue to improve the platform.