). While constituting a barrier to many apprentices, recent immigrants often face general communication barriers in addition to barriers posed by a lack of command of English or French (Gouvernement du Québec, Ministère de l’Éducation, 2002; 
).Recent immigrants face a number of barriers related to learning, including a lack of literacy and communication skills, inadequate ESL supports, and a lack of familiarity with local materials and equipment.
A lack of language and literacy skills is recognized
as a significant barrier to immigrants in various phases of the apprenticeship process (O’Neill & Gish, 2001; CREHS & Skills for Change, 2001; ). While constituting a barrier to many apprentices, recent immigrants often face general communication barriers in addition to barriers posed by a lack of command of English or French (Gouvernement du Québec, Ministère de l’Éducation, 2002; ).
Immigrants may also encounter barriers related to their insufficient grasp of both general and technical language skills (CLFDB, 1995; Jothen, 2001). This barrier can be continuous, in that it may affect recent immigrants’ performance at various stages of their apprenticeships.
For a recent immigrant still in the process of training for apprenticeship, the challenge of acquiring technical language skills presents an additional learning task, one for which adequatesupports do not exist. In certain trades, such as automotive serviceand repair, the quantity of new technical information published every year by automakers is considerable (one automaker alone produces some 60,000 pages per year) (
Inadequate exposure to the types of equipment or materials used in a Canadian trade context also poses a barrier (Atlin & Pond-White, 2000). This barrier arises when recent immigrants undergo foreign skills and credentials recognition and during actual training.
