Korean Immigrant Students

Canada has seen an increase in the number of immigrants, especially in Toronto to reach 46.1% of the population in 2016 (Stats Can, 2017). This implies an increase in immigrant youth population to pursue postsecondary education, contributing to an increasingly diverse student population. Despite higher participation rates in postsecondary education by immigrant students, not all immigrant students achieve above-average educational outcomes (Berger, 2009; Finnie & Muller, 2008). Research suggests international students in postsecondary education experience linguistic and cultural challenges, but little is known whether similar challenges exist for immigrant students (Zhang & Zhou, 2010, 2014). Furthermore, nothing is known about Korean immigrant

With an anticipation of the number of Korean immigrants to Canada to increase, most likely to Toronto, it is crucial to develop better strategies to accommodate Korean immigrant students. Since I speak fluent Korean, it will allow students to be able to participate in the interview with their language preference between Korean and English, to freely express their experiences. In addition, with my own experience as an immigrant, I would be able to easily relate to the participants with their challenges, allowing them to ensure that their voices are heard and understood. Although this study will be focused on Korean immigrant students, there is an implication of similar experiences among East Asian students from cultures with shared Confucius morals for further studies in the topic. With very few resources on the needs of immigrant students in postsecondary education, the University of Toronto is a good place to initiate research in a multicultural city where students may feel a better sense of belonging. There may already be a good awareness of the challenges of immigrant students and support services placed in the institution, and other institutions with a less diverse culture will be able to learn from resources available at the University of

Moreover, one study reported that children who arrived in Canada before the age of 9 have almost no risk of completing high school, but the level of risk increases at around the age of 14 or 15 (Corak, 2011). Thus, I intend to focus on interviewing 1.5 generation immigrant students, which commonly include those who have immigrated as a child or an adolescent, but more specifically to those who have completed some or all of high school in Canada before attending postsecondary education institutions, to discover their challenges at the University of Toronto. 10 students will be recruited with the help of email service for students in Faculty of Arts and Science to systematically select Korean immigrant students from different years and fields of undergraduate studies. Since Quinn’s (2013) research has already discovered some transition challenges for first-year students, this research will focus on second and third year student experiences with their studies. As it was discovered by Dickson (2010) that Asian students more likely to pursue sciences and engineering than humanities, participants will be recruited from sciences