Mexican seismologist working at Amazon warehouse part of overqualified immigrant workforce

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Raul González-Herrera came to Ottawa five years ago from Chiapas, Mexico, where he worked as a university professor, because he was convinced it was the best place to raise his two children.

He remains convinced of that fact even as he has struggled to put his considerable education to work in this country.

A civil engineer, González-Herrera holds a PhD in earth sciences and has published dozens of papers on seismology and earthquake engineering, but the 51-year-old has not been able to find a job here related to his field.

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Instead, he has worked for the past three years as a sorter, picker and packer at the Amazon fulfillment centre in Barrhaven.

“I feel frustrated in certain ways, but in other ways, I’m just happy to do something: It’s the way I can obtain money to buy groceries,” González-Herrera said in an interview.

“It’s hard to understand the way the job market functions here. I think it’s hard to compete if you do not have Canadian work experience.”

González-Herrera’s experience is not uncommon among highly-educated immigrants to Canada.

According to Statistics Canada, more than one-quarter of all immigrants with foreign degrees work in jobs for which they are overqualified – typically in jobs that require a high school diploma or less. It’s more than double the overqualification rate (10.6 per cent) among Canadian-born workers with university degrees.

“The overqualification of immigrants with foreign degrees is a longstanding issue, observed consistently since…the 2006 Census,” Statistics Canada reported in a study based on the 2021 census, the country’s most recent population survey.

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Statistics Canada found that even for immigrants with foreign degrees in high-demand, such as nursing, there were barriers to employment. The census showed that only 36.5 per cent of immigrants with a bachelor’s degree in nursing from a foreign country were working in the field. Slightly more immigrants (41.1 per cent) with a medical degree worked as doctors.

Just 1.1 per cent of Canadians hold a doctorate degree, and 8.2 per cent a master’s degree.

Studies suggest immigrant job seekers typically face language barriers, a lack of Canadian experience, and challenges in having their foreign credentials and skills recognized as comparable to those obtained in this country.

González-Herrera has faced all of those issues – and more.

He emigrated to Canada in 2019 with a plan. González-Herrera enrolled in Algonquin College’s construction engineering technician program, believing that the two-year co-op program would introduce him to local construction employers while also allowing him time to refine his English.

But the outbreak of the pandemic in early 2020 shut down co-op placements, depriving González-Herrera of critical Canadian experience. When he graduated in 2021, he earned a few interviews, but no job.

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After his family used their savings to buy a home in Embrun, González-Herrera was under pressure to start earning money. He took a job at the Amazon fulfillment centre in Barrhaven, a 65-km commute, before he could get his academic and professional credentials recognized in Canada. He intends to restart that process this year.

“All of the procedure is not easy and takes time,” he said.

González-Herrera’s search for a job in his field has also been complicated by a diagnosis of bladder cancer last year. He’s now recovered from his cancer treatment, and has been given a clean bill of health.

In Mexico, González-Herrera lived in the Chiapas state capital, Tuxtla Gutiérrez, where he worked as a university professor and researcher at the University of Sciences and Arts of Chiapas. He also consulted on the design and construction of buildings to ensure they could withstand the earthquakes common to the region.

Chiapas is the poorest of Mexico’s 31 states, and has in recent years been the scene of violent battles between rival crime cartels that compete to smuggle drugs and migrants.

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González-Herrera and his wife, Maria, would regularly vacation in Canada, and decided to move to this country in order to raise their children, now 8 and 9 years old.

“In some moments, there has been some depression about the situation,” González-Herrera said of his move to Ottawa. “Things are not easy but we are happy because we’re safe, and Canada is a wonderful country.

“I don’t have regrets because the principal reason was our kids, and they are good.”

Andrew Duffy is a National Newspaper Award-winning reporter and long-form feature writer based in Ottawa. To support his work, including exclusive content for subscribers only, sign up here: ottawacitizen.com/subscribe

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