As students across Canada prepare for a new school year, thousands of Syrian refugees are struggling to learn English and French due to long waiting lists for government-run language classes.

Only 5,433 Syrian refugees have enrolled in federally funded language courses out of more than 30,000 who arrived in Canada since last November.

The average waiting time to get into a course is about six months, and in some cases, the wait can stretch for years.

“Right now our wait list is about 108 students,” said Mita Basu, who runs an in-home tutor program through the government program. “There’s a wait time of about two years.”

With limited ability to communicate, some Syrian families feel they are struggling to adapt to their new lives in Canada. More.

See: CTV News

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