Official Languages Hub®: Background and introduction

From: Translation Bureau

Visit this page to learn more about the Official Languages Hub® and the reasons it was created.

Background

In 2016, Michael Wernick, former Clerk of the Privy Council and Secretary to the Cabinet, mandated Patrick Borbey (former Associate Deputy Minister at Canadian Heritage) and Matthew Mendelsohn (former Deputy Secretary to the Cabinet, Results and Delivery) to investigate the state of bilingualism in the federal public service.

As a result of the review, Patrick Borbey and Matthew Mendelsohn drafted the report The next level: Normalizing a culture of inclusive linguistic duality in the federal public service workplace. The report includes recommendations to help shape a public service of the future that genuinely includes both English and French, and where public servants feel empowered to use the official language of their choice.

The creation of the Official Languages Hub®, which is housed on the Language Portal of Canada, stems from one of the report’s recommendations on leadership:

“That the Public Service Commission of Canada, the Canada School of Public Service and the Treasury Board Secretariat build on existing work to establish an ‘OL: What Works’ portal for the Public Service to coordinate the dissemination and exchange of best practices and intervention tools that are currently in use.”

To implement this recommendation, the Language Portal of Canada (an initiative of Public Services and Procurement Canada’s Translation Bureau) established a working group which included representatives from:

  • the Treasury Board Secretariat’s Official Languages Centre
  • Canadian Heritage
  • the Canada School of Public Service
  • the Council of the Network of Official Languages Champions
  • the Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages
  • the Public Service Commission of Canada

As part of their work, the working group compiled an inventory of official languages resources to be included in the Hub and developed the search engine.

The second phase of the project, implemented in 2021, is the result of a collaboration between the Language Portal of Canada and the Council of the Network of Official Languages Champions (CNOLC). The goal of this collaboration was to add the contents of CNOLC’s Collection of official languages resources to the Hub in order to make all resources from federal organizations available in one place. During this phase, hundreds of organizations were invited to contribute by submitting their official languages resources.

To view the progress made on each recommendation listed in the report The next level, see the Dashboard on the status of the language of work recommendations.

Introduction

The Official Languages Hub® is a useful tool for federal public servants and Canadians who need information on any aspect of official languages. Public servants who have access to the Government of Canada’s network will also find resources drawn from GCpedia and the Government of Canada’s intranet.

The Hub allows you to simultaneously search through a host of resources from various federal departments and organizations. Currently, the Hub allows you to consult over 1,200 English and French pages that are found on the websites of various organizations.

Content and themes

The Official Languages Hub® allows you to find various types of content that meets your needs, including:

  • communication and outreach tools
  • policy instruments
  • learning resources
  • writing tools
  • videos and audio files
  • research and studies
  • reports

You’ll find information on a range of themes relating to official languages, including:

  • language of work
  • service delivery
  • second language evaluation
  • promotion of official languages
  • official language minority communities

You’ll find the complete list of themes and subthemes on the Search by theme in the Official Languages Hub® page.

For more information on how to search for content in the Official Languages Hub®, see the How to use the Official Languages Hub® page.

Questions and comments

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