Before - A permanent resident (PR) who wants to apply for a Canadian Citizenship needs to satisfy the residency requirement of 4 out of 6 years. That means, the applicant needs to be in Canada for a total of 4 years within a period of 6 years.
On Fall 2017 - The changes in the Citizenship Act includes the reduction of time a permanent resident must be physically present in Canada to three out of five years before applying for citizenship.
Applying for Citizenship on November
We were expecting to apply for citizenship on our 4th year in Canada. Fortunately, this good news from the government gave us hopes on having it earlier *fingers crossed*.
If no changes on the date of the effectivity, we will be eligible to apply on November 2017. Yay!
There surely be a lot of applicants for citizenship so we have to prepare our documents ahead.
Some of the requirements are available on hand. There will be no IELTS for both of us because of our credentials. To apply for the citizenship, we need a proof of language proficiency.
At least one of these documents.
1. Results of an accepted third-party test at the equivalent of Canadian Language Benchmark (CLB/NCLC) / Niveaux de compétence linguistique canadiens
2. Proof of completion of a secondary or post-secondary program conducted in French or English, either in Canada or abroad
3. Proof of achieving Canadian Language Benchmark/Niveaux de compétence linguistique canadiens (CLB/NCLC)
We have the #2 proof, which is the proof of completion of post-secondary program abroad. That means, no more exams on English proficiency for me and my wife. Another Yay!
But, there is one test that we need to write. It's the knowledge test on how well we know about Canada. It's for applicants 18-54 years old.
Preparation for Citizenship Application 2017
The important things that we need to prepare, aside from the tests and documents above, are the fees and the police clearance.
For the fees, we have to prepare a total of C$1, 460 based on the existing law. The breakdown is $630 for me + $630 for my wife and $100 for each child, and that's $200 for the two. These are the fees as of this writing, I'm not sure if they will change it in our favour.
On the other hand, it's required for applicant to submit a police clearance if we stayed more than 183 days outside Canada. If they will not change the number of years prior to application, I need to submit a police clearance from Singapore and my wife from Philippines.
This is not an easy thing to do, we need to contact friends for assistance in both countries. We'll cross the bridge when we get there.
Updates on our Citizenship Application
I made a membership site for Me Moving To Canada (MM2C Community) and readers need to register to gain access to it.
In there, I'll be posting every step in getting our citizenship. That includes photos and I'm thinking of videos too...let's see.
If you want to become a member of MM2C Community, go and register to this website. Click it!
Me Moving To Canada MM2C Community
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