Canada has been experiencing a skills gap for years. Termed “The Quiet Crisis”, there have been many high skills jobs available but a limited amount of qualified people to fill them.
In 2019, for example, Canada’s five largest cities had openings for thousands of positions in cybersecurity, cloud computing and IT auditing, digital marketing, content marketing, full-stack web development, machine learning, and UX Design1.
Although we are facing high unemployment, layoffs, and downsizing in many sectors, the skills gaps in the roles that support digital organizations and services aren’t going away. These are all fields where we see demand increasing due to the societal impacts of the COVID-19 crisis.
How can someone find their way into one of these high demand fields?
In 2016, Statistics Canada did a study that showed that when faced with layoffs, Canadian workers were more likely to upskill or reskill through short-term post-secondary programs2.
In difficult economic times, people turn to university continuing education. In every recession since the 1960’s, the response has been the same: when labour market opportunities are scarce, workers look for education alternatives to increase their earning potential. One of the most important factors for these workers is that the program is tied to jobs. The research also shows that higher-skilled graduates are more recession-proof.
As Canada’s leader in providing short, part-time online certificate programs in the fields of business and technology, we co-design courses with employers to fill these gaps in our workforce. Programs are only developed in areas where we and the major employers are convinced that there is a significant and sustained shortage of qualified candidates to fill vacancies. In many fields, the vacancies are so significant that we see employers recruiting students for positions mid-program with the confidence that the person will graduate within a matter of months.
Many of our part-time accelerated online certificate programs were already full before the COVID-19 pandemic impacted the economy, but due to increased demand, we have added new programs to our May 2020 schedule and we’ve added capacity to existing programs.
During this challenging time when Canadians are experiencing skyrocketing unemployment, Post- Secondary institutions are here to help end “The Quiet Crisis” and prepare the workforce to be ready to fill the high-demand jobs during, and after, COVID-19.
Interested in developing specialized knowledge and continuing your education in a particular area? You can view our full list of Certificate Programs by clicking here.
1Burning Glass Labour Market Data
2Wen Ci, Marc Frenette, and René Morissette. Do Layoffs Increase Transitions to Postsecondary Education Among Adults?. Statistics Canada. 2016
