TRANSCRIPT
When Nadia Mofrad arrived in Australia from Tehran in July 2018, she had big dreams.
The seed was planted at the age of 12 when it became apparent to her that STEM - science and technology subjects - were deemed a pursuit for the boys.
“I took part in a physics tournament. I put all my heart into it and I had to do this tournament and compete for weeks and weeks in a row. But right when I was about to be announced as the winner, the principal of the other school, talked to the judges and changed the results to favour my competitor. So it was right then the injustice made me feel like might be my future is definitely somewhere else.”
She wanted a future in that field and growing up hearing about her father's trip to Australia before she was born, she was intrigued to see if she could achieve success overseas.
Despite a steady and sustained diet of English-language TV shows and songs growing up, she found it took a few months to get used to Australian English.
“It was a big shock for me. First time, I remember when I went to...I was in the airport grabbing my luggage and I said: thank you. That other person told me: cheers. And I was thinking: we are not drinking right now. I don't know why you said cheers. So that was the first shock for me. The vocabularies are different, not only the accents. And I would say the first three months was not easy at all.”
Four years after arriving in Australia, after completing a Masters in International Business, she applied for a permanent resident visa.
An English-language test became necessary and she undertook the exam run by Pearson - called PTE (Pearson’s Test of English Academic) - a few times before achieving a score of 84 - within the highest percentile.
That not only helped to smooth the way for the visa application, but also helped with job offers.
“When you say things with a nicer words, with very more sophisticated and more academic words, when you try to articulate yourself, I feel like it's very important for me. It wasn't just for finding job. English helped me a lot to find friends here from all over the board. The diversity in Australia is amazing, and it helped me to have the confidence to go ahead and say hi to new people, the strangers that now are my best friends and they are like my family - the family that I don't have here in Australia.”
That trajectory has also been reflected in a report compiled by Pearson of 3,000 visa applicants who took their English-language test to reach the next milestone in their journey.
Those individuals in November 2023 reported higher salaries and employment outcomes, including earning an additional $20,000 per annum to the median Australian salary six months after arriving in Australia.
That has a flow-on effect to the broader economy in skilled employment areas of high demand.
Sasha Hampson at Pearson co-ordinates global stakeholder relations for the company's English-language test, which has been used as an option in Australian visa applications for 10 years.
She says the report is the first time the company has examined the aspirations and outcomes of migrants at that crucial time - before and after taking the test.
“Our data showed that we had significantly more people who were in age and disability care; and in nursing; and highly skilled areas like IT programming. People that were taking the Pearson Test of English went on to achieve employability. They went on to achieve permanent residency in Australia. They went on to graduate from our universities as talented individuals and secure employments. 91% had secured employment. So it's really clear that these individuals that are coming through are meeting the threshold and are then going on to make that positive contribution.”
Ms Hampson says the report's release - timed to coincide with Harmony Day and the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination - highlights the importance of recognising instances where skilled migration has delivered returns to Australian society and the economy.
“There may be an existing view that migrants are not providing value to Australia, but our data is certainly showing that they're making contributions to address the challenges that we have with ageing populations and with skilled shortages, and that they are filling the gaps where they're most needed. And so contributing to economy and productivity. But also contributing to society as a whole.”
Nadia says she took to documenting her settlement journey on social media [[Instagram]] - posting about her interactions with Australia's cockatoos and lorikeets as well as the initial culture shock - and she was surprised to find it resonated with audiences.
“People were sending the information to their friends, a friend of a friend, and it's grow very organically. I'm very proud of all the amazing 94,000 followers I have today; and I'm trying to help them by sharing the experience I had from. For example, when you want to pack your bag and go continents away, what will you pack? And how's driving on the other side of the road or don't do the things that end up like me being here. So they've been with me along my journey. I try to answer the questions about Australia and Australian way of living.”
Eric John de Guzman from the Philippines says his teaching qualifications were not recognised in Australia, putting him on a path to entering childcare and then pursuing a Master's in secondary education.
Taking the PTE test - with a score of 85-plus - allowed him to eventually get a job offer with a secondary college - even before completing his Master's - and all within the span of two years.
“I believe it definitely helped. It actually boosted my confidence in my English skills because I was like thinking at first: what if my English level is not good enough? But then with that score, I was like thinking not everybody can actually get the score like this. I believe that the employer also feels the same way. Seeing that I have that score, they feel confident that I'd be able to do the job or do the job properly. So I was able to get a job in different childcare centres. And also with my school right now.”
He says he was initially warned against coming to Australia by some who believed he would encounter racism - but that was not his experience.
“Actually that kind of made me nervous thinking, what if I actually experienced racial discrimination? I wonder how I'm going to react or I'm going to cope with that because that would be terrible to actually experience something like that. I've seen things like that happen in the media. But coming here now, not at all. Actually when it comes to culture and diversity, this is the melting pot. They're just many different people here. Having that realisation actually makes me feel more comfortable. So it kind of made me feel like, oh, it's actually not too bad to be different here.”
Abul Rizvi is a former Deputy Secretary of the Department of Immigration - and now a scholar on immigration policy.
He says while English-language proficiency is not the only determinant of success for skilled migrants who have a positive settlement experience, it is certainly a factor that has weight.
“Don't get me wrong. There are many migrants who have limited English, but still make a really great life in Australia. So it's not an across the board thing, but on average, better English increases your prospects of success both in the labor market and in Australian society. So to the extent that we can help migrants improve their English, that can only help.”
A report by the Committee for Economic Development of Australia looking at the broader experience of migration, including the humanitarian visa program, found that English-language proficiency was a significant factor explaining lower wages for recent migrants.
On average, their research found migrants who have been in Australia for up to six years earned more than 10 per cent less than Australian-born workers.
It found that weaker language proficiency reduced wages for recent migrants by around nine per cent, on average.
The federal government announced in December [[2023]] that it would be increasing the English-language test requirement from early this year .
For example, the English-language standard for the student visa will lift to 6.0 (up from 5.5) in the I-E-L-T-S test - or to 51.6 (from 45.4) in the PTE score.
Dr Rizvi says there are ways to further look to reduce friction and skills mismatch with skilled migrants - and that includes English-language test requirements for more visa types, other ways of better recognising the international qualifications of migrants, as well as employers playing a bigger role.
“On the one hand, the employer lobby groups push really, really hard about skill shortages, and they want an expanded immigration program. They want more people brought into the country through the skill stream. That's fine. But on the other hand, the takeup of employer sponsored visas where the migrant gets a job straight away is very, very low. What the employer lobby groups haven't explained to me is why the discrepancy. If you're saying we're so desperately short, we have these desperate shortages, why aren't more people coming through the employer sponsored categories? And what are you - employer lobby groups - doing about that?”
