Following the signing of the Agreement on Internal Trade (AIT) in 1995, full mobility within Canada became mandatory for all trades and professions, including teaching, as of August 2009.

In 2014, negotiations to strengthen the AIT began under the guidance of the Council of the Federation, which is composed of Canada’s premiers. As a result, in 2017 the Canadian Free Trade Agreement (CFTA) replaced the AIT.

The CFTA Labour Mobility provisions (chapter 7) assert that “certified workers have to be recognized as qualified to work by a regulatory body in another province or territory which regulates that occupation, without having to go through significant additional training, work experience, examination or assessment, unless an exception has been posted.” Teachers are included among certified workers and are subject to these dictates. To benefit from these CFTA provisions, a teacher may have to complete an application process to transfer certification. The transfer process usually requires the applicant to submit various forms and documents and may also require them to provide other relevant information, e.g., evidence of language proficiency.

Provincial and territorial regulatory bodies for the teaching profession from all 13 provinces and territories in Canada, through CMEC’s Registrars for Teacher Certification Canada (RTCC) committee, have collaborated to establish mechanisms to allow the reconciliation of provincial/territorial policies and practices aimed at improving teacher mobility.

More recently, under RTCC’s leadership, the Pan-Canadian Assessment Centre and Integration of Internationally Educated Teachers project (2019–23) was initiated with a goal towards establishing a new service to support such teachers. The service is expected to officially launch in 2024 and is called Pathways to Teach Canada.

Pathways to Teach Canada will provide a single window of entry for internationally educated teachers (IETs) to apply for licensure in participating provinces and territories. Pathways to Teach Canada will be responsible for assessing the credentials and language competencies of IETs who would like to teach in a participating province or territory in Canada. Pathways to Teach Canada aims to:

  • improve access to pre-arrival information for IETs;
  • promote the adoption of fair, transparent, consistent, and timely assessment and recognition procedures, which will lead to the issuing of licenses to practice for IETs in participating provinces and territories;
  •  improve labour-market integration outcomes of IETs in the teaching profession in participating provinces and territories.

The language competencies of IETs will be assessed using the Language Competency Assessment for the Teaching Profession (LCATP). The LCATP is a test that comprises four one-hour-long online modules, which assess writing, reading, listening, and speaking skills. The LCATP will assess the knowledge of language and grammar, and it will also measure specific language competencies that are essential to teach effectively in English‐first language and French‐first‐language majority and minority contexts.

Pathways to Teach Canada operations will be housed within CMEC, as a consortium of participating provinces and territories.

A Business Case and Implementation Plan of a Pan-Canadian Credential Assessment Centre for Internationally Educated Teachers report was published in 2022 and contains additional information about Pathways to Teach Canada. An RTCC language-competency assessment report was also published in 2022 and includes additional information about the Language Competency Assessments for the Teaching Profession (LCATP) service, which is coordinated by Pathways to Teach Canada.

 

Related links: