Canadian Experience Class
The Canadian Experience Class (CEC) is one of the categories under which an applicant for Permanent Residence in Canada can apply under the Express Entry Program of the Department of Immigration of Canada. As the name suggests, it is a special category to facilitate the immigration to Canada for those applicants who have earlier worked in Canada.The first criteria to be eligible is the work experience in Canada. Of the last three years before applying for Express Entry, at least 12 months must have been spent working in Canada. That experience must have been outside Quebec (which has a separate program),
and the work must have been obtained and carried out using legal means. In case the experience was part time, then the total period worked must be equivalent to 12 months of full time employment. There is a National Occupancy Classification (NOC) in Canada, which has 5 categories 0, A, B, C and D. For being eligible to apply under CEC, the applicant’s work experience must be in any of the occupations listed under 0 (managerial)or A (professional) or B (technical or skilled). The applicant must be able to prove that the work he did was exactly what is described in NOC for the particular category he is applying under. For applicants under CEC, the education requirements that are listed under the FSWP are waived off.But if the applicant has a Canadian educational qualification, then he could get extra points in his Express Entry ranking. Even if the educational qualification is from a foreign country, he could get points for it if it is equivalent to the corresponding Canadian qualification, which has to be certified by an ECA report.
The next thing that an applicant needs to look at is his language proficiency. The Canadian Language Benchmark (CLB) is used as the criteria for qualification. If the applicant is under NOC occupation 0 or A, then he needs to have a minimum CLB level of 7. For applicants under NOC occupation B, the minimum CLB level is 5. Additionally, the applicant also needs to clear the standard language tests as laid down in the Express Entry regulations – CELPIP or IELTS for English, and TEF for French.
Finally, the applicant must prove himself to be eligible to live and work in Canada, for which factors like posing security risk, participating in organized crime, health issues etc are taken into account.
