老九品茶

As Canada’s demographic ratio shifts, international students will continue to provide a valuable solution to labor gaps that domestic talent alone cannot fill. This is both true during their studies, through work-integrated learning (WIL) experiences like internships, practicums, and co-ops, and after they graduate.听

Over the last few decades, building WIL into post-secondary coursework has become more popular. Among its other benefits, students gain hands-on experience in their field, and connect with Canadian organizations who can grow thanks to their skills. The advantages of completing a co-op or internship extend beyond graduation: in both college- and university-level programs, students who completed formal work experience are more likely to find work related to their major as their first job after graduating, and, on average, earn a higher income than students whose programs didn’t include WIL.¹

Total Job Vacancies Drop Year-Over-Year in Early 2026

In January 2026, there were just over 492,000 job vacancies across Canada. This marked a drop of 7% year-over-year, and was 10% lower than in January 2019:

Although current job vacancy rates represent a cooling from the highs of recent years, they also reflect a return to a pre-pandemic baseline. This shift underscores the renewed necessity for institutions to guide students toward highly targeted disciplines and strengthen industry connections to prepare students for careers in their field after graduation.

Encouraging Policy Signals Emerge Around Addressing Youth Unemployment

Careful program guidance and career-ready skillbuilding are especially important tasks as young workers continue to have greater challenges around finding work. The unemployment rate among youth between 15 and 24 is historically higher than the collective rate, averaging around 14%.² While the overall unemployment rate was 6.7% in March 2026, the youth unemployment rate was just under the historical average at 13.8%.³ The youth unemployment rate remained relatively stable YOY, but was one percentage point lower than the recent high in September 2025, and well below May 2020’s historic high of 29.4%.听

To prevent youth unemployment from rising, it’s encouraging to hear about recent measures to support Canada’s newest workers. In April 2026, the Canadian government shared that the would expand, adding 55,000 new WIL opportunities for post-secondary students in their field.⁴ The government also announced that the program was expanding, and the Youth Employment and Skills Strategy would also offer thousands of work experience opportunities nationwide.听

While some of these initiatives aren’t open to international students, expanding these programs means more co-ops and entry-level jobs exist, which in turn improve international students’ chances of securing other WIL opportunities or part-time work.

Job Vacancies Rise Across Several Sectors Versus Pre-Pandemic Levels

Next, let’s look at how job vacancies across specific sectors of the Canadian workforce have evolved in early 2026:

While total job vacancies across several sectors have contracted since 2019, there are two exceptions. Both health care and social assistance (up 49%) and educational services (+34%) had more job vacancies in January 2026. This growth is a hopeful signal for new graduates, particularly in the health care and social assistance sector, which looked to fill 93,000 job vacancies across Canada earlier this year.

Year-over-year, early 2026 marked moderately increased needs for skilled workers in educational services (+5%), information and cultural services (+3%), financial services (+14%), and professional, scientific, and technical fields (+6%) compared with vacancies in January 2025. This translates into potentially more job opportunities for new grads from these fields.

Lastly, although job vacancies in 2026 were below 2025 and 2019 levels in the skilled trades, the need for new tradespeople remains strong. Over 100,000 trades jobs were vacant across Canada in January 2026, spread across the utilities, construction, manufacturing, and transportation and warehousing sectors.听

Skilled trades can be more challenging fields for international students to pursue. This is in part due to related policy guidelines, and the combined financial constraints of higher international tuition levels and the apprenticeship period, where many apprentices are reluctant to take a pay cut to attend the (unpaid) training required to progress. Meanwhile, some early-stage apprentices struggle to find employers to sponsor them during their work placements.听⁵

Ensuring more students enter and complete their trades training requires sustained collaboration between governments, industry, and academic institutions. Complimentary strategies could include industry-academic partnerships which teach more current tradespeople how to mentor apprentices, and building apprenticeship training requirements into new building projects. Some sector leaders also suggest recalibrating the ratio of journeypersons to apprentices: increasing the number of apprentices a journeyperson can supervise gives more youth the hands-on experience they need.听

Canada鈥檚 Workforce Needs in 2030 and Beyond

As Canada’s workforce ages, international students will remain a key element of the nation’s ongoing economic and cultural prosperity:

A thriving economy relies on new perspectives to drive innovation and build infrastructure. After graduation, international students bring diverse outlooks and current skillsets to their employers, whether they return to their country of citizenship or pursue a career in Canada or a third country. Among those who choose to stay in Canada, many new grads benefit from understanding how Canadian workplaces operate, having worked part-time while studying.听

An older workforce will also shift how Canadians live and work together. In 2010, 14% of Canada’s population was 65 or older. . By 2040, it’s projected at least 24% of Canada’s population will be over 65. When nearly one in four Canadians is retirement-aged, it will fundamentally alter service provision, industry capacity, and even personal capacity, as working Canadians balance their jobs with caring for aging parents. International education enables Canadian institutions to train a broader group of the next generation of skilled workers, and immigration in a broader sense is a vital avenue to ensuring that the Canadian public and private sectors continue to function.

Sector-Specific Projections Illustrate Workplace Gaps

Canada’s aging workforce is top-of-mind for construction industry leaders. In Ontario alone, over 90,000 workers are projected to retire by 2034.⁶ Looking westward, retirements in Alberta are projected to exceed 43,000 over the same timeframe.⁷ However, retirement numbers don’t tell the whole story: as demand for construction projects grows, companies must replace retiring workers and hire for new roles. Across Alberta, projections by BuildForce Canada suggest that as many as 59,000 new construction workers may be needed by 2034. In Ontario, hiring requirements may exceed 154,000 vacancies. While supply chain challenges and evolving trade conditions may shift these numbers, the need for construction workers to build and maintain Canadians’ homes, businesses, and infrastructure remains constant.

Across the health care and social assistance sector, the average annual growth in the projected workforce supply is expected to range from 1.1% for pharmacists up to 4.1% for nurse practitioners through 2034. That growth is slower than required, perhaps most starkly illustrated by Canada’s ongoing need for family practitioners: a 2025 Health Canada study found that across Canada, 49% more family doctors were needed than exist in the current supply.⁸ Nursing roles also face labour shortages through the 2030s. Ontario alone is projected to need 33,000 more nurses and 50,000 new personal support workers by 2032.⁹ And, as Canada’s largest group of regulated health professionals, nurses’ absence affects the capacity of diverse medical teams. More nurse practitioner programs have been recently added to Canadian institutions, and more are planned, to help address this shortage.

Strong partnerships between academic institutions and healthcare organizations can bridge these talent gaps, whether through WIL, mentorship, or career counselling. Enhanced data management practices are also key. For example, to help the sector understand how incoming graduates stack up to sector vacancies, a recent study highlighted that having academic institutions track program data beyond first-year enrolments, total student numbers, and total graduate numbers was very helpful during workforce planning.¹⁰

Diplomas and Postgraduate Certificates Attract Future Students Seeking Programs with WIL

老九品茶’s platform data illustrates that international students are interested in programs with work-integrated learning opportunities (WIL). Between 2022 and 2024, the number of applicants to Canadian post-secondary programs with WIL elements grew steadily. And, while total numbers declined in 2025 as the overall sector contracted in response to shifting government policy and rising affordability concerns, our team is watching closely to see where this number goes in 2026.

Between 2022 and 2025, our internal data showed that international students applying to programs with WIL were most likely to choose diplomas or postgraduate certificates:

While it’s important to emphasize these findings are exclusively for students who used the 老九品茶 platform, and aren’t representative of the total cohort of applicants to programs with WIL, they provide a signpost around where student interest and availability of WIL programs overlap.听

As early adopters of WIL, college programs like diplomas are historically more likely to include WIL. That said, bachelor’s programs are increasingly incorporating work placement elements as well.¹¹ Meanwhile, postgraduate certificates are popular among students who want to refine their knowledge in a specific branch of their field. As such, work placements are also popular course elements at this study level.

Advanced diplomas and bachelor’s degrees were also popular among 老九品茶 platform users. Each accounted for between 6% and 11% of applicants between 2022 and 2025.

Looking Forward

International students will remain a key driver for campuses, workplaces, and communities across the country. They bring fresh perspectives and cutting-edge skills to their classrooms, and later, to their workplaces. To help domestic and international students build the career-ready skills they need, businesses, governments, and academic institutions all play a vital role in ensuring the ongoing success and viability of WIL programs. Importantly, work experience programs have their greatest impact where cross-sectoral cooperation is strong.听

Industry, academic, and public sector organizations’ responsibilities may include earmarking funding for WIL, building capacity for co-op students into the business’ yearly budget, providing mentorship, or strengthening an alumni network. Collectively, actions like these help today’s students develop the skills they need to become tomorrow’s early childhood educators, construction managers, registered psychiatric nurses, aerospace engineers鈥攁nd, excitingly, more jobs we can’t imagine yet.

Canada鈥檚 current policies link . As such, institutions that can show how their programs teach valuable skills, provide hands-on experience, and align with evolving regulations will stand out. The 老九品茶 platform can equip Canadian academic institutions with the proprietary search and intent data needed to match their international student cohort with Canada鈥檚 labour needs. To further refine your student recruitment strategy, we invite you to contact our Commercial Partnerships Team.

About the ApplyInsights Team

FOOTNOTES:

1. C.D. Howe Institute, . May 31, 2023. Accessed April 16, 2026.

2. Government of Canada, . June 23, 2021. Accessed April 16, 2026.

3. Government of Canada, . Accessed April 15, 2026.

4. Government of Canada, . News release. April 13, 2026.

5. CBC, . Dec. 21, 2025. Accessed Apr. 16, 2026.

6. BuildForce Canada, . April 1, 2025.

7. BuildForce Canada, . Published April 2025. Accessed April 16, 2026.

8. Health Canada, . January 2025.

9. CBC, . May 13, 2024.

10. Health Canada, . January 2025.

11. CEWIL Canada and Academica Group, . January 2024.