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Multiple programs supporting immigrant and refugee settlement in British Columbia are losing federal funding, as the Canadian government plans to decrease the number of newcomers allowed into the country.
Immigrant Parents as Literacy Supporters (IPALS), run by the non-profit Decoda Literacy Solutions, is one of the impacted programs. It had been fully funded by federal grants for ten years — about $450,000 per year.
"The funding was not renewed, full stop," said Decoda executive director Sandra Lee. "We were really shocked."
According to Lee, IPALS ran in 19 communities in the Lower Mainland, Kelowna, Nanaimo and Victoria. It helped teach literacy skills to newcomer families and introduce them to the B.C. school system to improve their kids' success going into kindergarten.
"Our family literacy programs for them are critical building blocks for getting sorted out for school. I suspect too that connections will be lost and I believe that they'll be less successful in coming, integrating and settling," Lee said.
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