Canada’s Economic Action Plan invests in job creation for students

Vaughan, Ontario — The Honourable Julian Fantino, Associate Minister of National Defence and Member of Parliament for Vaughan, on behalf of the Honourable Diane Finley, Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development, today announced that more students in Vaughan are having the opportunity to gain valuable work experience and earn money for the upcoming school year thanks to support from the Government of Canada. Minister Fantino made the announcement at the Ahmadiyya Muslim Mosque.

“Our Government has received a strong mandate from Canadians to continue creating jobs and economic growth. That’s why, starting in 2011, we are helping students by permanently increased the budget for the Canada Summer Jobs initiative by $10 million,” said Minister Fantino. “This additional permanent funding will create as many as 3 500 additional jobs for students this summer across Canada, strengthening the local economies of our communities.”

This year a total of 91 student summer jobs have been approved for Vaughan alone – through 39 agreements signed with employers. Vaughan will receive $217,436 in Canada Summer Jobs funding, which will enable 23,108.5 hours of work experience for students to gain the skills they need to compete in today’s labour market.

“Canada Summer Jobs benefits our community, our local economy and especially the students of Vaughan,” added Minister Fantino. “Through this initiative and others, our government is helping Canada’s youth succeed now and in the future.”

Canada Summer Jobs is an important part of the government’s long-term Youth Employment Strategy that helps young people get the information, skills and work experience they need to make a successful transition to the workplace.

Backgrounder

Canada Summer Jobs is a Government of Canada initiative that helps employers create summer job opportunities for students.

The program provides funding to not-for-profit organizations, public-sector employers and small businesses (with fewer than 50 employees) to create summer job opportunities for young people aged 15 to 30 years who are full-time students and intend to return to school in the next school year.

Canada Summer Jobs is part of the Summer Work Experience program, which is one of three programs that help young Canadians—particularly those facing barriers to employment—obtain career information, develop skills, gain work experience, find good jobs and stay employed. The other two programs are Skills Link and Career Focus.

Youth employment programs are part of the Government of Canada’s strategy to create the best educated, most skilled and most flexible workforce in the world. The Government underscored its commitment to this strategy in Canada’s Economic Action Plan. A key component of the Plan is to create more and better opportunities for Canadian workers through skills development. To learn more about Canada’s Economic Action Plan, visit www.actionplan.gc.ca.

Further information on youth employment opportunities can be found at www.youth.gc.ca.