It’s important to spend some time thinking about how you can prepare for your student’s arrival into your workplace and figuring out what they will need to know to be successful. Below are some key points during the onboarding process. 
 

• Before the first day
  • Set up a designated work space, email and organization accounts
  • Develop a training plan for their first few weeks
• During the first day
  • Tour the office
  • Provide general organization/industry orientation materials to be reviewed
  • Have a team member take them to lunch; ensure student is now included (as appropriate) in team activities 
• During the first two weeks
  • Schedule meeting between students and their supervisor
  • Provide a training plan and schedule 
  • Introduce to entirety of team or as necessary.

Onboarding is a crucial step in integrating a student within the organization structure and culture. A strong onboarding process can relieve a lot of the stress and waiting around that a student might experience in their first couple of weeks on the job. Through effective onboarding, students will be able to meet their new team, understand the structure of the organization, and become productive quicker as they gain confidence and understanding of the team’s internal processes. 

Depending on the size of your organization, different people might be in charge of the onboarding process for a new student. An HR personnel may help with the logistics of setting up the students’ email, IT equipment, welcome package and so on. In smaller organizations, this may be done by a committee or by the supervisor themselves. In either case, the supervisor is a strong point of contact to welcome the student to their job and introduce them to the rest of the team. 

Students can apply for a work visa for up to three years in length after graduating as long as they have completed a program of at least two years in length. Once they have a work visa, you can hire them like any other employee. 

Later, if you wish to keep them on, and they wish to stay in Canada, you can apply for a Labour Market Impact Assessment or the employee can apply for permanent residency.

International students are, typically, multilingual and can have a high level of cultural awareness and can increase the diversity in your workplace which often brings new perspectives to your organization. Businesses seeking to enter or expand into international markets or who are increasingly noticing their client base is composed of newcomers to Canada often benefit from international students. International students can offer a deeper understanding of cross-cultural communication and may even be able to provide valuable international contacts. Finally, international students often come with a wealth of previous education and experience that could prove valuable to your organization. 

Paying an international student works in the same way as paying a domestic student. The regulations for minimum wage and labour standards are the same for international students as they are for all Canadians. The process of paying will be similar as they will have a Social Insurance Number (SIN) with their student work permit. 

In order to decolonize and indigenize your hiring process, it is important to answer the following questions.
 

Questions about your workplace and intercultural training:

• Does your organization have a clear sense of why they want to hire Indigenous students?
• What have supervisors in your organization done to decolonize your workplace culture?

Questions about hiring and retention:

• How do you intend to support an indigenous students in the workplace?
• If applicants experience tokenization, how will your organization address it?
• Does your organization offer any accommodations for cultural and family obligations?

For more information, you can read UBC’s “Decolonizing and Indigenizing your hiring process”

Funding can be found by province to help pay for accommodations people with disabilities may need. For more information, see National Educational Association of Disabled Students’ (NEADS) page on Finding Funding to Accommodate Students with Disability.

As an employer to employees with disability, you have the following rights and responsibilities around your duty to accommodate.

You are obliged to: 

• Take every reasonable step in order to accommodate an employee when they are experiencing discrimination due to a rule, practice or physical barrier in the workplace. 
• Accommodate by providing alternative arrangements in a timely manner
• Accommodate to the point of undue hardship (see “What is Undue Hardship?”)
• Accept an accommodation request in good faith
• Maintain confidentiality
• Explain clearly to your employee why you cannot provide the accommodation, if such is the case 

You have the right to:

• Request relevant information about the employee’s disability 
• Have the employee be examined by your own medical professional in order to assess their accommodation needs and examine the amount of hardship that might be placed on you in accommodating the employee 

For the rights and responsibilities of employees with disability, see “What are my rights & responsibilities as an employee with a disability?” of the student FAQ.

If an employee has disclosed a disability to the organisation and asks for accommodations, the employer has a legal responsibility to accommodate to the point of undue hardship. Undue hardship is defined as a non-trivial cost to the employer that puts an unnecessary burden on the business to accommodate. Undue hardship has no set formula as it is business by business and case by case specific. Some factors when determining undue hardship are:

• Financial cost
• Disruption of a collective agreement
• Risk of problems with other employees
• Size of the business and interchangeability of the workplace
• The health and safety risks attached to the accommodation

For more information, you can read NEADS’ Duty to Accommodate and Disclosure in Employment.

There are four key factors that allow for an accessible and welcoming environment for people with disabilities.

• Leadership commitment. Senior leaders in particular need to be committed to change in order to shift the culture 
• Diversity and inclusion champions. Champions lead change and can be used to carry the message of inclusion
• A long-term sustainable plan for inclusion. This includes a vision to educate and raise awareness among employees, review employment systems to ensure that the needs of employees with disabilities are identified and met. As well, a structured plan will help hold managers accountable for their efforts to create an inclusive work environment 
• The ability to enable any policies and practices that are conceived within the organization. Diversity and inclusion will fall short without the implementation of long term plans and policies.

Every employee is different, with unique abilities and needs. As such, all employees, with or without disabilities, require accommodations of some sort. Most of the time, accommodations for employees with an intellectual disability or Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) do not cost your business anything at all. Common accommodations are simple workplace modifications or assistive technology. As an employer, you are legally required to accommodate employees with disabilities to the point of undue hardship.

You can find qualified students with disabilities in the same ways you can find those without disabilities e.g. job postings, contacting your local campus or trade association. However, there are a few things to keep in mind if your organization is seeking to specifically advertise to students with disabilities:
 

1. Make the job posting and interview accessible. See “How do I make the interview accessible for people with disabilities?”
2. Engage community disability organizations and post-secondary career resource centres to share job posting with qualified students with disabilities. Many post-secondary institution career departments are more than willing to help employers reach an audience of qualified students with disabilities.