A $2-million fund to help disadvantaged youth obtain undergraduate degrees at the University of Victoria has been set up by the Sisters of St. Ann.
“The endowment is to provide education opportunities for young people who have been in government care, and who don’t have the support that many other people have from their families,” said Sister Marie Zarowny, provincial leader of the Sisters of St. Ann, on Thursday.
The Sisters of St. Ann created the Youth in Care Student Award Endowment to assist students formerly in government care who are now pursuing undergraduate degrees at the university. The Roman Catholic women’s order is dedicated to supporting underprivileged Canadians, and hopes to assist through UVic those who would not otherwise have access to post-secondary education.
The endowment will benefit those in need as well as the families that support them, Zarowny said.
“As we reflected on this need, we felt this is exactly the kind of void to be filled that our founders would have responded to.”
The endowment will fund in perpetuity up to 15 students annually. The gift expands upon a UVic pilot program from last year that grew out of a challenge from Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond, B.C.’s representative for children and youth. In 2013, Turpel-Lafond asked all post-secondary institutions in the province to waive post-secondary tuition fees for former youth in care.
“They really are all of our children, and I think by putting this type of financial investment there, I think it really speaks volumes about the values of the Sisters that I hope will inspire others,” Turpel-Lafond said.
She said the province has gone from having just a few former foster children in post-secondary schools to more than 100 this year. Of the province’s 25 colleges and universities, 11 have waived tuition for former children in care.
“Not only are we going to reap the benefits of a society from that, but lives are being changed,” Turpel-Lafond said. “And a lot of the trauma and challenges that those young people faced, they actually work hard to address and overcome that in their college and university years. So they hopefully don’t have another generation, within their own families, involved in these systems of care.”
The Sisters of St. Ann endowment will directly benefit UVic students like Lilia Zaharieva, who is studying to receive her bachelor’s degree in child and youth care. She is one of five students pegged to receive the first Youth in Care Student Award Endowment, and is hoping to work with former foster children like herself upon graduation.
“I was so honoured today to meet with some of the Sisters of St. Ann, and it was a joy to get to ask some of them how they came to this life of service,” Zaharieva said.
“It was very meaningful to be, in some way, a part of that incredible legacy. My gratitude can only be expressed by moving those values forward to my own work in education.”
— With files from Lindsay Kines
