How should I write SOP or Letter of Explanation for Canada Student Visa after Refusal?
When students receive an offer letter from Canadian universities to study in Canada, the next thing they need to prepare is a Study Permit to visit the country and commence their education in the beautiful country. Study Permit i.e. Student Visa is awarded by the Visa officers of the Canadian embassy after a detailed evaluation of the student’s profile.
The Students are supposed to submit an SOP for Student Visa along with all the others required documents. Now, this SOP is a very critical document. Student’s future to pursue the courses in his dream university of a Canada depends on it. Therefore, it is crucial to prepare a Statement of Purpose (SOP) which appeals to the Visa officer and persuade him to award the student his Study permit.
However, few students don’t pay attention to the SOP for the first time and they end up submitting a lousy written Visa SOP. The Visa officers go through the SOP and reject the Study permit of the student. They produce a refusal letter which contains the reason of the refusal.
Although, due to outbreak of Covid-19, Canada has been rejecting lots of applications. Even some of them are genuine who have gotten AIP and already been enrolled for online classes. This makes it more important to prepare a well-drafted Statement of Purpose for Student Visa.
What to do when you have gotten the Rejection for Canada Student Visa?
When you get the rejection, they send you a refusal letter containing brief reasons about why they rejected your applications. However, they also ask you to reapply if there had been a mistake on their part.
So, you can always reapply if you feel the reasons stated in the refusal letters are not valid. In case, if you feel you need much more information to understand what they are saying about refusal Reasons then you can apply for GCMS or CAIPS Notes.
GCMS Notes — The Global Case Management System CIC’s (Citizenship and Immigrtion Canada’s) single, Integrated and worldwide system which IRCC uses internally to process applications for citizenship and immigration. This note provided a detailed and accurate information about one’s application. It also contains officer’s note regarding the refusal. Students use this information and reapply with Strong Letter of Explanation after Refusal to get the student Visa.
CAIPS Notes — Computer Assisted Immigration Processing System are electronic notes which provide information about the Visa applications in Canada. With the help of CAIPS Notes, students can understand where their application was lacking and then they can prepare a convincing SOP for Canada Study Visa after Refusal to get the study permit with ease.
Now, the only problem that is there with the GCMS and CAIPS notes is that it takes almost 30–40 days to received the notes after you apply. In the times of Covid-19, this time has also been increased. Therefore, most students use the Refusal letter that they got in the first place and reapply after preparing a SOP for Canada Student Visa.
What are the reasons mentioned in the Refusal Letter and how to address them?
In General, there are 2 reasons that Visa officers give once they have refused the application for student visa.
1. They are not satisfied that Student will leave Canada after the completion of the course.
2. Student’s work experience and Previous studies are not in line with the current program i.e. they fail to find any relevant connection between the current program and your previous studies and work.
There could be other reasons as well such as the language ability. For e.g. You have given the IELTS exam and your overall score is less than 6 or in any section you have managed to get less than 6 score, then your application will be rejected on the basis of language ability. However, above mentioned 2 reasons are more prominent. Now, let’s understand how can we address these 2 reasons in detail.
First Reason — A great number of people want to settle in Canada. Lately, there had been a lot of applications and most of them are not eligible. Therefore, people have come up with a new solution. They apply for a program to study in in one of the colleges / universities of Canada, complete their education, extend their stay by getting a job and then applying for Permanent Residence. As easy as it is for the Immigrants, Canadian governments don’t want such crowd. So, they are extra vigilant about the immigrants who are applying to Visit Canada to study.
Now, Students can provide an explanation regarding this in a manner that their sole reason to come to Canada is to take advantage of its world class education system and not to settle. They can talk about their future goals and how they wish them to fulfil in their home country i.e. India if you live in India and applying from there.
Along with that you can also talk about your strong family ties. Family is an important part of everyone’s life. One can not break their ties with the family just to settle in another country. One can sound a bit emotional about it in their SOP.
One more thing that one can talk about is their personal / family assets and properties. No matter what our properties and assets require our constant assistance to function properly.
Mentioning these things in your SOP for Canada Study Visa for reapplication, you can surely convince that you plan to study in Canada and not settle there.
Second Reason — Studies are the foundation on which we advance our work and if we go for some course which is unrelated then it could put questions on student’s motive. It raises doubts in the mind of Visa officers if someone wants to change their field entirely and applying for some other course.
For e.g. A Student has done your engineering with Electronics background. Now, he wants to study Masters in Data Science from Canada. It doesn’t make sense; at least to the Visa officer.
Therefore, either he can change his course and choose a relevant one or he can explain his mind why he feels the current program is relevant and will help him in his future goals and mission.
It is critical to let the Visa Officer understand one’s point of view so that he could be on the same page with student. Failing to do so by submitting lousy SOP will surely bring anything but rejection.
Age Gap Rejection
Some people also get rejection based on the gap in their studies. For e.g. if someone has a gap of 10 years and he fails to explain what made him go for study in Canada at this time then he will face rejection. He might have genuine reasons to study at this point of his career.
He might have wanted to upgrade his skills and catch-up with the new technology or do a little research in his domain. But, failing to explain his visions would certainly cost him rejection.
Conclusion
You need not to panic if you have gotten a Student Visa Refusal. Calm down, go through the refusal reasons and introspect. Check your SOP and understand where it was lacking. If you need more information regarding the rejection and have time before the commencement of the semester then apply for GCMS or CAPIS notes for detailed information. Prepare a strong Letter of Explanation (LOE) and reapply.
Even if you have gotten 2 times of 3 times rejection, they let you reapply. Therefore, panicking won’t do you any good, working on your justification letter for Canada visa rejection will.
Some agencies offer Visa SOP Writing Services. These agencies have professional SOP writers who have significant years of experience in writing SOPs. So, if you feel you require assistance from experts, you can get in touch with them and get yourself a beautifully written SOP.
Here is the list of Recommended SOP Writing Agencies
1. Contentholic
2. SOPPro.in
3. SOPLOR.com
4. Visasopwriters.com
5. Suneet.in