Melissa Kelly is a Research Fellow with the Canada Excellence Research Chair
(CERC) in Migration and Integration at Ryerson University. Melissa holds a PhD
in Social and Economic Geography from Uppsala University in Sweden. She was a
Research Associate at the Institute for Housing and Urban Research in Uppsala
and was affiliated with the Graduate School in Population Dynamics and Public
Policy at Umeå University. Her research interests include comparative
immigration policy, primary and secondary migration patterns, and immigrant
integration in rural and remote areas. Currently, she is carrying out a research
project on the factors influencing immigrant retention in small and medium-sized
cities in rural and remote parts of Canada. Melissa has published her research
in several peer-reviewed journals and books. She has also contributed to the
development of immigration and integration policies and programs for the
Government of Canada.