KAMLOOPS – Thompson Rivers University (TRU) students will learn the value of acting according to their social consciences thanks to the establishment of a generous award by a well-known Canadian couple.
Monia Mazigh and husband Maher Arar will establish a sizable scholarship at TRU, where Mazigh has taught for the past year.
“We have been thinking for a while how to best give back to the Kamloops community,” explained Mazigh. “We want to encourage students to be socially responsible and active while maintaining high academic standing, and we found that TRU was the best place in Kamloops to allow us to achieve these objectives.”
The Mazigh’s gift, a scholarship of $2000 per year, is one of the Foundation’s most significant commitments in terms of annual award value, as most annual awards are $1000 and under. It includes in its criteria requirements that the student be an academic achiever as well as actively involved in furthering social equality, the elimination of racism and racial profiling and the improvement of the lives of the poor, among other causes.
“We believe in encouraging social responsibility and community involvement. We hope this scholarship will motivate students to be both academically exceptional and socially active,” said Arar.
“As the TRU Foundation celebrates 25 years of support for students and to the university, we are honoured to have such a meaningful gift made to the Foundation for such significant purposes,” said Foundation executive director Kathleen Biagioni. “We look forward to TRU students making a difference, locally, as they are inspired by Maher Arar and Monia Mazigh to engage in social justice issues.”
Applications for the scholarship, which will be offered for the first time in November, 2008, will be adjudicated by a committee comprised of former Dean of Arts and English professor, Professor Emeritus Henry Hubert and two TRU faculty members, Gail McKay, an assistant professor in the School of Business and Economics and Nelaine Mora-Diez, an assistant professor in the chemistry department.
“We would like to thank the TRU Foundation and everyone who was involved in setting up this scholarship,” said Mazigh, who offered some final words to those wanting to know of a simple, doable action that any person could do to further social justice in Canada and the world:
“Write a letter to the local newspaper whenever you hear about injustice being committed locally, nationally or internationally,” urged Mazigh, who knows well the power of the written word through her campaign on her husband’s behalf.
Mazigh and Arar, who have made headlines around the world related to the campaign mounted by Mazigh to bring her husband home to Canada from the Syrian jail in which he was incarcerated as a suspected terrorist, and her subsequent call to the Canadian government to launch an inquiry into the matter, with the result that in October 2006, Judge O’Connor cleared Arar of any suspicion related to terrorism, received an apology and compensation from the Canadian government in January 2007.
For more information, please contact:
Monia Mazigh at 250-828-5156
Dayanti at 613-265-7530
Kathleen Biagioni at 250-828-5266.
