Community Essay

Canadian society has often seen itself has having fiduciary responsibility to help those who cannot mend tor themselves. One ot the social groups included in those described as such are the newcomers or those who have migrated into Canada fairly recently. Having left their homelands in search of greener pastures; this paper intends to examine the multiple facets they have to deal with in order to survive in Canada’s highly competitive society. One of the students in the LINC program of Saskatchewan Polytechnic is cited as an example of a person coping with these social Justice issues. Academic acumen is chieved through improved fluency in English in order to help them become productive members of the workforce or to enable them to gain access to university education. Keywords: microcosm, fiduciary, facets, acumen, fluency 3 Definition of Social Justice Terms Buettner-Schmidt; et al (2012) defines social Justice as fair partaking in society with all the benefits and obligations. This gives people a situation seen as equitable standards in life. Qualities seen include fair treatment, equality in distribution of resources, Just social structures, equal chance of human development, and sufficient ealth care opportunity. Employment would be a condition wherein a person has a source of livelihood of a legitimate nature. Income status would be a condition defined as having a considerable amount of money going into a person’s resource base needed to sustain life. Review of Literature Koh et al. (2010) have determined that, â€Å"Specifically, eliminating health disparities will require heightened emphasis on translating and disseminating proven interventions in a way that will reach all people, irrespective of social class or racial and ethnic background. It will also require transcending the confines of academia to reach and influence broader real-world settings (paragraph 4). † This article from the American Journal of Public Medicine views social Justice as a method by which health inequities should be corrected by using proven and time-tested techniques. It also encourages dissemination of resources regardless of social, racial, or cultural background. This article also envisions social Justice advocacy beyond the academe and into society as a whole. 4 Gostin, L et al. 2006) describes social Justice such that: â€Å"A core insight of social ustice is that there are multiple causal pathways to numerous dimensions of disadvantage. These include poverty, substandard housing, poor education, unhygienic and polluted environments, and social disintegration. These and many other causal agents lead to systematic disadvantage not only in health, but also in nearly every aspect ot social, economic, and political lite (paragraph 6). à ¢â‚¬  This tells us that lack of social Justice can be seen within the context of an inequitable chance of having good healthcare. This problem is connected to other issues of deprivation uch as lack of education, poverty, living in dilapidated housing in inner city areas, and thriving in unhygienic surroundings. In essence how can a person avail of proper health care if he or she is uneducated, lives in a ghetto or slum area, or if he or she is living in abject deprivation with no sustainable source of income? Nevertheless there are those that view social Justice in health care using different parameters. According to Scambler, G (201 1); â€Å"Both material and psychosocial factors contribute to these differences and their effects extend to most diseases and causes of death. Disadvantage has many forms and may be absolute or relative. It can include having few family assets, having a poorer education during adolescence, having insecure employment, becoming stuck in a hazardous or dead-end Job, living in poor housing, trying to bring up a family in difficult circumstances and living on an inadequate retirement pension (paragraph 16). This article views lack of social Justice resulting in a life with a poor standard of health as a mere effect of previous injustices committed on a person who lives in dire poverty. If a person comes from several enerations of a poor family, inadequate education leading to having a minimum wage Job, or if a person lives in a community that has no social support then most likely that person cannot participate in an equitable health care system. Using Social Justice Tools to Assess Economic Conditions of Newcomers in to Canada 5 Discussion Nursing student volunteers are facing a challenge when thinking of social Justice principles when doing volunteer work in the LINC program. Issues such as employment, working conditions, income, and social status may be seen as emotionally charged and can cause an uncomfortable feeling. The nursing student volunteer must learn to broaden his or her horizon when dealing with health determinants such as employment situation or income disparity. Even in developed nations such as Canada a new immigrant may feel marginalized if a person is not given the chance to have access to proper social services. While volunteering in the LINC program of Saskatchewan Polytechnic; one would determine that student volunteers need an opportunity to work with social Justice tools with guidance of members of the academe. The LINC student that is cited as an example relative to this study is AM, male, 37 ears old, and he was from the Philippines.