Ontario Supporting New French-language Training for Nurses in Ottawa

Investment Will Strengthen Province’s Bilingual Health Care Workforce

OTTAWA — The Ontario government is investing more than $400,000 towards innovative training and hands-on learning opportunities for French-language nursing students in Ottawa so they can continue to receive world-class education during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Details were shared today by Jill Dunlop, Minister of Colleges and Universities, who was joined by Goldie Ghamari, Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Colleges and Universities at Collège La Cité.

This investment is supporting the University of Ottawa, La Cité and Montfort Hospital to offer approximately 350 nursing students the tools and clinical experience they need to bolster Ontario’s health care and long-term care sectors.

“Ontario has listened to the needs of the health care community and is taking action to provide the resources and training that will help prepare nurses to deliver care in an environment that has been altered by COVID-19,” said Minister Dunlop. “We also recognize the importance of offering French-language training for nurses to prepare for work in Francophone and bilingual health settings.”

The University of Ottawa, La Cité and Montfort Hospital are pairing patient care with simulation exercises which enables Francophone students to develop their clinical competency skills. The approach ensures that hospital health and safety regulations enhanced by COVID-19 are respected while allowing currently non-accessible clinical activities to take place through simulation activities.

The University of Ottawa and La Cité will also jointly develop virtual modules in French so students can learn certain skills in a safe, virtual environment, dealing particularly with essential competencies such as ethics, infections and immunity.

This initiative is supported through labour market transfers between the Government of Canada and the Government of Ontario.

Quick Facts

• Investing in nursing education supports the government’s Long-Term Care Staffing Plan that was launched last year. At the centre of this plan, the hours of direct care for residents in long-term care will be increasing to an average of four hours per day over four years. To implement this initiative, the government will be making overall investments of $1.9 billion annually by 2024-2025.
• La Cité is the first and largest French-language College of Applied Arts and Technology in Ontario and helps to ensure that the province’s Francophone community has access to quality college programs and services in French.
• The University of Ottawa is the largest French-English bilingual university in the world, offering more than 450 programs in 10 faculties, including a medical school.
• Montfort Hospital is Ontario’s Francophone academic hospital, with a mission to improve access to health care in French by training future generations of physicians and health care professionals.
• This year, the Government of Canada is providing over $1.1B for training and employment supports to Ontarian workers and employers under the labour market transfers. Each year, more than 200,000 Ontarians receive supports funded by the Canada-Ontario Labour Market Development Agreement and the Canada-Ontario Workforce Development Agreement.

Source Province of Ontario