Overview, Streams, TRPS and ARCs, Professionalism, and Future Developments

Ron McKay

Ron McKay has been involved professionally in the practice of immigration from 1986 to present. He previously served as a locally-engaged Overseas Immigration Officer and later worked as an Immigration Consultant at the Vancouver based law firm of Clark Wilsons LLP. In the capacity of Immigration Consultant he is presently employed by the CANGO and GUANGSON Immigration Consulting Firms. For the last three years, he has been employed as the Director of Immigration Programs at Ashton College.

Ron McKay is a Past President of the Canadian Association of Professional Immigration Consultants (“CAPIC”) and a Past Chair of the Immigration Consultants of Canada Regulatory Council (“ICCRC”). He has previously served on multiple stakeholder committees involving Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, the Canada Border Services Agency, Service Canada, the Immigration and Refugee Board and Continuing Legal Education.
In regard to this CPD Seminar – Ron McKay will serve as the emcee/moderator.

Jane Desmond

Jane Desmond has been an immigration consultant and instructor for sixteen years. Jane has built a solid reputation amongst her peers. Her experience, coupled with her work in the community, have afforded her extensive legal exposure and understanding. Furthermore, her in-depth knowledge and insight have been sought by television networks – OMNI News, Globo (the largest television network in Brazil), and various local ethnic media outlets – to explain the implications of the changes in government policies and regulations in immigration. 

Jane has successfully managed a Toronto-based consulting company, which represents clients before Immigration Refugees and Citizenship Canada, the Immigration and Refugee Board throughout Canada, and in many of the Canadian visa posts abroad. 

Al Parsai

Al Parsai is a Regulated Canadian Immigration Consultant. He runs a successful business in downtown Toronto, Ontario with many employees. Al is also the author of 88 Tips on Immigration to Canada. He is a member of the Immigration Consultants of Canada Regulatory Council and the Canadian Association of Professional Immigration Consultants. Al has represented hundreds of applicants from more than 35 countries to the Canadian immigration authorities. With a master’s degree in Counselling Psychology, Al has extensive experience as an author, trainer, and public speaker. He has written ten books and hundreds of articles over the past 20 years. Al has also delivered many courses, workshops, and speeches in four different countries.

Daniel Mcleod

Richard Kurland

Richard Kurland is an Attorney at Law in the provinces of British Columbia and Quebec. He is best known as the Editor-in-Chief of Lexbase Immigration, and his motto is: Keeping Ottawa Honest. He produces a monthly release of information obtained under the Access to Information Act called Lexbase. His contribution to the immigration practice across the board is best described as invaluable. He has a great sense of humour and his presentations are always a treat for practitioners, whether lawyers or consultants.

Howard Greenberg

Howard Greenberg, along with Naumaan Hameed, founded the Greenberg Hameed PC, a firm that provides its clients with a fresh approach to immigration services, that tackles the ever-changing world in its immigration policies and improved technologies. Howard specializes in providing Immigration Law based strategy advice to multinational corporations. Additionally, he has 30 years of experience under his belt, facilitating entry to Canada for foreigners for work reasons. 

Howard also spoke about critical topics at many law centric places including, but not limited to, the International Bar Association conference, the Canadian Employment Relocation Council Conference, the Law Society of Upper Canada Annual Immigration Law Summit, the Canadian Bar Association National Citizenship & Immigration Conference, Insight, Canadian Institute, and the Engineering Human Resources Association. 

Howard’s previous work was him lecturing part time about Corporate Immigration Advocacy at the University of Ottawa Faculty of Law. 

Annie Beaudoin

Annie Beaudoin is a Regulated Canadian Immigration Consultant under the Immigration Consultants of Canada Regulatory Council (ICCRC). She is also currently a professor (Immigration Law) at the University of Montréal and a speaker for major Canadian immigration organizations including IMEDA, Canadian Association of Professional Immigration Consultants-CAPIC, Ashton College, ImmSeminars, and others.  

Ms. Beaudoin has over 15 years of experience from working at the Quebec Delegation in Boston to working for the Federal Government of Canada at the Canadian Consulate General in Los Angeles where she was promoted to the highest Officer level as a Designated Immigration Officer. She has a unique background as she was the sole bilingual Designated Immigration Officer in Los Angeles which allowed her to work on a wide variety of applications and of course on the majority of French files through all the Quebec Immigration Programs.  

This line of work also contributed to furthering Ms. Beaudoin’s uncommon and advanced expertise in all inadmissibilities to Canada including security, organized crime, criminal, medical, financial, and familial inadmissibility. This knowledge is extremely rare in the Canadian Immigration field. As part of the permanent staff in the US, she has also gained a high-level expertise of criminal inadmissibility from the 50 United States of America & other countries, and the concrete equivalencies to the Canadian Criminal Code and provincial statutes. She is an expert in Rehabilitation Approval and Temporary Resident Permits applications for those who have a criminal conviction(s) on their record.  

Ms. Beaudoin has also been the author of multiple investigative reports on trends in US and Canadian immigration with impact/implications on Canadian government policies and consequences of migration movements.    

Marty Baram

Marty Baram is the Director of SYMY Immigration Consultants and Recruitment, an agency focused on filling labour shortages and matching talented foreign workers with suitable Canadian employers. He has successfully placed hundreds of foreign nationals as temporary workers and permanent residents in Canada.

Marty is currently a member of the Board of Directors at the Immigration Consultants of Canada Regulatory Council. He is also Vice-Chair of the Registration and Education Committee, a member of the Finance and Audit and Human Resource and Compensation committees and a past member of the Practice Experience Program Advisory Committee for the ICCRC. His areas of expertise include international recruitment, labour market impact assessments, Francophone mobility, permanent residence applications, express entry and provincial nominee programs.

Marty received his Immigration Consulting Diploma from Humber College, where he graduated with honours. Marty is a member in good standing with the ICCRC and The Canadian Association of Professional Immigration Consultants.