Rojeana Chanoine
Principal Investigator

Prior to joining CME and ESSH, Rojeana worked in International Development, as a Research Fellow at the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) in Washington, D.C., where she focused on projects related to the mainstreaming of social and economic inclusion of Afro-Descendants and Indigenous peoples in Latin America. Rojeana holds a Bachelor of Arts with dual majors in Sociology and French Language and Literature from the George Washington University, and a Master's of Science in Education from Johns Hopkins University. She is fluent in English, French and Spanish.

Phone: 514.866.7774 ext. 2264   |   e-mail: rojeana.chanoine@cme-mec.ca

Reflections      Success Stories      Participants

Reflections

By Rojeana Chanoine

Teaching the ESSH Learning a Culture of Safety course has been an eye-opening experience when it came to working with immigrant adult learners who, for the most part, have language barriers or lack basic essential skills, preventing them to better prosper in their workplace.

By teaching this course, I realized that when it comes to working with immigrant adult learners and dealing with a topic which in this case, was foreign to them, the best approach is to construct the course around discussions where the participants feel as though they are taking part in a conversation rather than just sitting and taking notes in a classroom. This approach worked very well for the Beta course version in Quebec.

This entire process made me realize that when it comes to health and safety training, modeling the course specifically to the needs of the learners/participants is the most effective approach. They seem to have a better understanding and appreciation of the material and are therefore more likely to apply what they learned in the course directly onto the shop floor.

Success Stories

Rapid Snack

The ESSH Learning a Culture of Safety 10-week beta course was a big success in the province of Quebec. We worked with a "progressive" food industry company, Rapid Snack Inc., located in Lasalle, Quebec. Rapid Snack Inc. specializes in making custom marshmallow and cereal bars for private label and co-pack customers throughout North America.

The course was developed to have workers think differently about safety while on the job/plant floor. The modern and hands-on approach of the course allowed each worker to see that safety practices were present in their every day lives and not just while on the job. It made them realize that safety was more of a "culture" rather than just wearing the necessary safety equipment because "they were told to do so".

Over all, the participants came out of the course with a much better and clearer understanding of safety practices in Canada and said they would highly recommend the course to new immigrants entering manufacturing plants in a country where health and safety practices are usually foreign to them.

Participants

	AB Mauri Fleischmann has been supplying the food and baking industries with best-in-class yeast and bakery ingredients for well over 100 years.
	Boulangerie Cantor has grown from a pastry and coffee shop in 1923 to a major supplier of superior baked products to supermarkets, restaurants and institutions through a network of partners in Canada and the U.S.
	Fordia offers global drilling solutions with a complete range of diamond tools, equipment and accessories for the mineral exploration and geotechnical industries, as well as providing outstanding customer service and technical support.
	Rapid Snack, through its division, Yourbarfactory is in charge of producing custom rice crispy squares and nutrition bars for private label and co-pack customers.
	Peerless Clothing Inc. is the largest manufacturer of fine tailored clothing in North America, supplying men's and boys' suits, sport coats, tuxedos, and trousers to major department stores in the U.S.