As the 2009 year comes to a close, so to does the Millennium, or as it is more formally known the Canadian Millennium Scholarship Foundation (CMSF). In the realm of Post-Secondary Education (PSE) in Canada, I believe that there has been no organization as influential or as successful as the CMSF.
This comprehensive program distributed $285 million a year in financial needs based Bursaries; provided Access Bursaries to assist students of traditionally underrepresented groups attend PSE; encouraged student leadership and innovation through its Excellence Awards program; and conducted valuable PSE focused research that will continue to shape the way PSE in Canada operates.
It is because of the work of the CMSF that so many young Canadians have had the opportunity to attend PSE and that so many young Canadians have succeeded in becoming leaders and innovators. It seems that almost every student currently enrolled in PSE knows someone who has been positively impacted by the Bursaries and Awards disbursed by the CMSF. Entering university in 2006, I received a Millennium Excellence Award, without which my own successful participation in PSE would have been much less likely.
As an Excellence Award winner I was constantly encouraged to network with other Excellence Award winners and was invited to attend conferences and share ideas about improving the world we live in. CMSF promoted learning and leadership outside of the classroom, and even provided grants to participants who had the ambition to lead an innovative and self directed project with the purpose of creating positive change. The Millennium Scholarship Foundation is about the pursuit of dreams; academic dreams, careers dreams, and life dreams. I for one am very thankful to the CMSF for making my dreams possible.
So as we ring in the new decade this new years eve, may we also stop to remember and pay our respects, to what will be known as the best Millennium in the history of post-secondary education in Canada.
-Kory Preston
