Nicole Osayande was surrounded by Black and South Asian students while attending C.W. Jeffreys, a high school in a northwest Toronto neighbourhood with a diverse population. Activism and advocacy were routine, part of an everyday effort to change negative attitudes about the teens she mingled with every day.
The project grew to a team of 30 students, with Ms. Osayande serving as president for three years. Her work included efforts to encourage more students of diverse backgrounds to apply to the university. In the classroom, Ms. Osayande studied biomedical computing and worked with a professor to build software modules for a hip replacement surgery tool.
The scholarship program, launched in 2019 with a $200-million fund provided by philanthropists John and Marcy McCall MacBain, is aimed at allowing students from across Canada and the globe to pursue higher learning at McGill University when otherwise that chance would be out of reach. Another recipient, Zeytouna Suleiman of Montreal, wants to work in human rights. The 22-year-old had volunteered with the Muslim Students Association at McGill for several years and has worked at a local women’s shelter and a resource centre for victims of domestic violence.
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I know some of those students who, living here, in unique Montreal is, according to them, not all that. 'Racist Quebec' is what I heard twice just the other day. These students will not make their lives here. They will leave. Truth