Press Release: York-Keele Local Committee Wins Local Committee of the Year Award

Congratulations to the winners of the 2018 Local Committee of the Year Award, York-Keele Local Committee!

Announced annually at the WUSC and CECI International Forum, the Local Committee of the Year Award is awarded by the Board of Directors to recognize the recent contribution of a group of students to international development and the Student Refugee Program. York-Keele accepted their award at the International Forum evening celebration on January 25, after a full day of discussions surrounding Development in Motion with close to 600 participants in attendance.

Exceptional leadership and community engagement

Since its inauguration in 1987, the York University – Keele Campus Local Committee has sponsored 28 young refugees to resettle in Canada and receive post-secondary education. Within the last few years, the York-Keele Committee has considerably expanded their Student Refugee Program by securing increased waiver funds from the York University Administration. This Committee stood out because of their leadership on campus and ability to grow their membership in recent years. In the 2017-2018 academic year, the York-Keele Committee was able to increase their impact through collaborating with partners on campus and in their community. In doing this, they were able to raise awareness and strengthen support for refugee issues.

The York-Keele Local Committee welcomed four SRP students to their campus this past August.

An exciting initiative this Committee took on last year was co-hosting the Canadian Council for Refugees 2018 Youth Action Gathering. The event gathered over 100 youth from across Canada to share, learn, and network on common challenges facing newcomers, and identifying strategies to address them.

In addition to these large scale events, the York-Keele Local Committee has worked to secure contract extensions on campus and club ratification, supported a local refugee shelter clothing drive, held thank you campaigns, supported the creation of WUSC at Seneca, fundraised for transportation loans, and collaborated with Green Campus Co-Op to campaign for Fair Trade food on their campuses.

In March of 2019, they will be holding a referendum campaign with the hopes of increasing their annual sponsorship from four students per year to six.

For all their hard work in 2018, we would like to extend a congratulations to the students, faculty and staff of the York-Keele University Local Committee!

The Student Refugee Program

The Student Refugee Program is the only program of its kind to combine opportunities for resettlement and post-secondary education. Since its creation in 1978, it has supported more than 1,900 young refugees from 39 countries of origin to resettle and study at universities, colleges, and CEGEPs across Canada.

The program is unique for its peer-to-peer model which allows young global citizens on Canadian campuses to take a leadership role in welcoming and facilitating the integration of newly arrived students.

To learn more about Local Committees and peer-to-peer sponsorship, check out our website.