Good Ideas from Toronto: An Exchange of Immigrant Integration Practices

November 28 to December 2, 2011 | Stuttgart, Hamburg, Berlin, Cologne

Cities are the destination of choice for most immigrants. The welcome cities provide to their newest residents is key to successful integration and, in the end, vital to their social and economic health. It’s also essential to the ongoing prosperity of the cities themselves. It’s not surprising then that cities world-wide are eager to learn from each other about what works in integrating immigrants.

From November 28 to December 2, 2011, a delegation from Toronto, led by Maytree’s president Ratna Omidvar and chairman Alan Broadbent, visited four cities in Germany (Stuttgart, Hamburg, Berlin, and Cologne) to share good practices in immigrant integration.

In each city, the delegates also had an opportunity to visit with staff of German projects to learn about local immigrant integration practices.

Featured Practice from the ExchangeView all practices

Immigrant-Success-Awards

Telling Stories – Spreading Awareness About What Works

TRIEC

Telling stories of success is an important strategy for building awareness and illustrating how change can happen. In 2004, TRIEC set out to identify the stories of employer success to illustrate to other employers how they can benefit from the skills of immigrants. To find these stories, TRIEC created an awards program with two objectives; [...]

Report from the RoadView all reports

Berlin - the WallSmall

Pictures from Germany

Thursday, December 22nd, 2011

From November 28 to December 2, we had the opportunity to visit four cities in Germany (Stuttgart, Hamburg, Berlin, and Cologne) to share good practices in immigrant integration. In each city, we also visited with staff of German projects to learn about local immigrant integration practices. Experience the German tour through four short slideshows.

Berlin video

Video from Berlin – Gute Ideen aus Kanada

Wednesday, December 7th, 2011

Thanks to the Heinrich Böll Stiftung in Berlin, we have a video of the Berlin presentation. Since the whole presentation was three hours long, we’re giving you the option to watch the individual segments. Peter Boehm, Ambassador of Canada in Germany: Welcome Ratna Omidvar, President, Maytree: Introduction Alan Broadbent, Founder and Chairman, Maytree: Historical context and [...]

Join us on the road

You can find more information about the Exchange on the about page or by downloading our program in PDF format.

Delegates

The delegates are:

  • Matt Galloway, Host, Metro Morning, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC)
  • Elizabeth McIsaac, Executive Director, Toronto Region Immigrant Employment Council (TRIEC)
  • Donna Quan, Deputy Director – Academic, Toronto District School Board
  • Peter Sloly, Deputy Police Chief, Toronto Police Service (TPS)

Twitter

We’ll be providing updates and insights from Germany on our Twitter feed with the hashtag #GERexchange