Eight members of the Class of 2022 have received Student Leadership Awards from the University of Toronto for their outstanding volunteer contributions to the life of the College and the larger University. Over their student careers, they have played foundational roles in the life of St. Michael’s community, founded and led clubs, edited journals and books, and much more.
St. Michael’s Congratulates:
Cianna Choo – Cianna’s leadership roles include serving as Executive and Treasurer of the Arts and Science Student Union, President of the St. Michael’s College Student Union, Orientation Coordinator, Orientation Marshal, Senior Mentor, and Student Representative on both the Senate and the Collegium. Her work on behalf of the St. Michael’s student body has helped her peers experience richer community, and her advocacy has strengthened ties between students, faculty, and St. Michael’s leadership.
Simran Dhir – From tutoring and mentoring her peers to coordinating performances of the St. Michael’s College Troubadours and helping to organize Orientation over multiple years, Simran has directly enriched St. Michael’s community and culture while also helping her fellow students to find support and feel at home. As Major Operations Manager of the Communicatable Club at St. Mike’s this academic year, she has organized regular workshops and events to help students develop soft skills.
Abigail Iyekekpolor – Abigail has invested much of her time at St. Michael’s directly in the lives of her peers, cultivating community and providing support for several years as a residence don and as an orientation leader. She also created the social media campaign #SoulsOfSMC, an initiative that creates space for diverse expressions of identity among St. Michael’s students. It continues to provide a window into the lives of members of the St. Michael’s student body while enriching the larger community.
Fasika Jembere – With volunteer and service experience ranging from direct support for her St. Michael’s peers to leading initiatives across U of T, Fasika has left a deep impression during her student career. She has served as president of the Equity Studies Student Union (ESSU) since September of 2021 and in the role has overseen initiatives in direct response to the pandemic, including the distribution of Covid mutual care packages to U of T students.
Ren Manalo – Ren has supported her fellow students as a mentor with St. Michael’s Mentorship and the Filipino Students’ Association and has helped new students find a home at St. Michael’s as an orientation leader. Currently, she serves as co-president of the Medieval Studies Undergraduate Society, and plans events and generates enthusiasm for the St. Michael’s-sponsored academic program. She has helped grow the Society from a dozen members to a welcoming and diverse community of over 50 students.
Ashwini Selvakumaran – Ashwini was a recipient of the 2020 University of Toronto COVID-19 Student Engagement Award, for which she co-authored an e-book featuring global student perspectives on the pandemic. Her volunteer and service work on and off campus includes engagements in tri-campus mental health advocacy; founding the Brown Citizen Circle (BCC), a non-profit that serves to amplify BIPOC youth voices; co-directing the 2020-2021 annual Peace, Conflict and Justice Student Conference; and serving as the 2021-2022 Editor of the Rapoport Journal of Peace, Conflict and Justice.
Adriana Williams – Adriana was one of nine participants to consult with the Honourable Chrystia Freeland on issues affecting Black Canadians during the pandemic, a recognition of Adriana’s work on behalf of the Black community throughout her undergraduate career. Her four-year association with the Black Students’ Association at U of T culminated in her becoming the organization’s president, and in the role she has continued to help build safe spaces for Black students in the university community.
Ingrid Wong – In a variety of roles with St. Michael’s College Mentorship, Orientation, and Fontbonne House Council, Ingrid has helped her fellow students to feel welcome and included at St. Michael’s. She has also raised awareness of and advocated for human rights as co-president of HanVoice’s University of Toronto chapter and helped shape academic discourse in editorial roles with Synergy: the Journal of Contemporary Asian Studies.
From finding community on campus or earning top marks in challenging courses—even to becoming a mother just days before Convocation—members of St. Michael’s Class of 2021 have had a rich and unique set of experiences.
This year’s St. Michael’s class is large by University of Toronto standards. 817 students will receive degrees during a virtual convocation ceremony at noon EDT on June 23, and at 10:30 a.m. that day, members of the class will also be presented with a variety of College awards recognizing academic achievement and community involvement.
“St. Mike’s is known as the Catholic college, and features humanities and theological studies,” graduand Ruikai Wu says. His outstanding marks earned him this year’s College Gold Medal for science, which is the degree designation of the largest share of this year’s graduating class, and he is also one of two graduands to be nominated for the U of T Governor General’s Silver Medal. Wu’s goals for his university studies were to learn science and critical thinking, and he chose St. Michael’s as his college in order to gain exposure to non-scientific fields. “To understand the science better, you need to understand how people think and behave,” he says.
While his performance in Life Science courses related to microbiology and molecular biology helped him earn his award, one of Wu’s most meaningful course experiences was English 100-Effective Writing. “No matter what you do or study, you need to write clearly, to avoid abstract words and tense confusion,” he says.
Wu found a home at St. Mike’s after meeting other entrance scholarship recipients at a lunch that also included St. Michael’s staff members. “It felt nice because U of T is such a large place, and St. Mike’s is smaller but still a big place,” he says. Meeting fellow students helped give Wu a “feeling of community and a sense that there were people to talk to.” He also credits Assistant Registrar Nawang Khangkar with helping him feel welcome and cared about at St. Mike’s. “My experience at St. Mike’s would be very different” if not for her help, he says.
Fellow Life Sciences student Omar Elbardisy came to feel at home at St. Mike’s as a commuter student after attending Orientation Week events his first year. The College Silver Medal winner is the other U of T Governor General’s Silver Medal nominee for St. Mike’s, and like Wu, carried a 4.0 CGPA through his studies.
He also found great value in taking non-science courses. “I am from an Egyptian background; I was born there and lived there for a while before immigrating,” he says. “Being at U of T in a completely foreign country and seeing courses that address my home country really impacted me.” One of the most meaningful he took was Voices from Ancient Egypt, which he found “more literature and essay based” than his other classes in a way that he found “mutually enriching.
“I had to think about the material in a different way, and I studied differently… taking an interdisciplinary course makes you go beyond the readings, do your own research, and really helped me a lot,” he says.
Foundational to Elbardisy’s success in both scientific and humanities courses was the goal of truly understanding content instead of relying on rote memorization. He also sought balance through involvement in extracurricular activities at St. Michael’s such as intramural soccer, Orientation leadership, and connections with his commuter dons, all of which helped him feel at home at the College.
Community involvement and academic achievement in Italian Studies together qualified Chiara Muia to receive an Alberto and Caroline Morgan Di Giovanni Centro Scuola Scholarship. “During Orientation Week of my first year I was overwhelmed by how welcoming everyone at St. Mike’s was,” she says. She kept in touch with her leaders all four years, and forged friendships that have lasted through her student career.
Muia also found surprising upsides to working on her classes remotely. “Though I missed being on campus, I found that being online actually allowed me to talk to my professors much more,” she says. The ease with which she could reach out for a quick video chat “allowed me to get a lot more out of my classes than I generally would have.”
Muia took one of her most meaningful classes in her last semester. JCI350: Italian Canadian Culture and Identity “allowed me to better understand the history of my family and connect with them in a way I never have before,” Muia says.
Fellow graduand Samantha Ramphal found her studies and extracurricular involvement at St. Mike’s to help integrate many parts of her life. A transformative experience in the Gilson Seminar on Faith and Ideas her first year led the Environment and Health major to pick up Christianity and Culture as a minor. She will be receiving the Mercier-Knowlton Prize for Philosophy in Christianity and Culture and the Marina Santin Award at the USMC graduation awards ceremony on Wednesday.
“I enjoyed the experience of being in such a small and intimate classroom and having the chance to deepen my faith,” Ramphal says. Her experiences in the classroom led as well to a variety of extracurricular involvement including presenting a paper at St. Michael’s student research colloquium in 2017, volunteering as a student representative on the St. Michael’s Collegium, and serving as a student leader in the Christianity and Culture club.
The awards being given recognize the achievements of these and many other talented students, but they also point to bright futures after graduation. Wu will be entering a PhD program in the University of Toronto Department of Biochemistry, while Elbardisy will be starting medical school this fall, also at U of T. Muia’s next stop is a three-year Master of Architecture program at the Azrieli School of Architecture and Urbanism at Carleton University.
But Ramphal has perhaps the most unique next step of all. She welcomed her son Raphael into the world on the afternoon of Sunday, June 6—only weeks before convocation. Is he a future St. Michael’s student? We can only hope.
The University of St. Michael’s College Graduation Awards Ceremony will take place at 10:30 a.m. EDT on Wednesday, June 23.
Five members of the Class of 2021 have received Student Leadership Awards from the University of Toronto for their outstanding volunteer contributions to the life of the College and the larger University. Over their student careers, they have worked to deepen and enrich the community of St. Michael’s and UofT, advocated for programs and received awards for academic achievements, and pursued environmental initiatives to help keep the University on a path to a sustainable future.
St. Michael’s congratulates:
Natalie Barbuzzi – Natalie’s leadership in cultivating community in the student body at St. Michael’s has been demonstrated through her involvement in senior roles in the Mentorship program and with the Commuter Don team as well as multiple years of involvement with St. Michael’s Orientation. She also pursues social and environmental justice at the University through roles with the Environmental Sustainability Society and University of Toronto Policython.
Adam Da Costa Gomes – Adam has helped many fellow students feel more at home at St. Mike’s through his work as founding secretary for SMC Inclusive, a club dedicated to creating inclusive and LGBTQ+ positive spaces on campus, and through several roles with St. Michael’s Orientation. He has also left a mark on the University’s approach to mental health and its academic community through volunteering as Undergraduate Representative for both the Faculty of Arts & Science’s Mental Health Initiatives Advisory Group and the University of Toronto Advisory Committee to the President for the Selection of the Dean, Faculty of Arts and Sciences.
Chiara Perry – Chiara works to help every member of the student body feel welcome and included through her work as both Vice President of Community Life for SMCSU and Social Functions Coordinator for the Indigenous Studies Student Union. She has directly supported fellow St. Michael’s students over several years through the Mentorship program and multiple roles with St. Michael’s Orientation.
Nour Ramzi – Nour has enriched campus life through her multi-year involvement with SMC Troubadours, a student theatre group, and has helped to foster community at St. Michael’s and at the University of Toronto through her involvement in St. Michael’s Orientation and her work as Executive Events Associate for the Middle Eastern Students’ Association.
Christeen Salik – In addition to her work as a Student & Youth Mental Health Art-ivist who founded Healing Hearts Through Art (h2art) and as a Mindful Moments facilitator for the Multi-Faith Centre, Christeen has served as a Marshal Lead for St. Michael’s Orientation, playing a major role in giving St. Mike’s students their first experiences of the College’s unique community. She currently pursues environmental and social justice–focused objectives as President of the Board of Directors for the Ontario Public Interest Research Group of Toronto (OPIRG Toronto).
Established in 1994 by the University of Toronto Alumni Association (UTAA) and the Division of University Advancement, the University of Toronto Student Leadership Awards (formerly the Gordon Cressy Student Leadership Awards) recognize students who have made outstanding extra-curricular contributions to their college, faculty or school, or to the university as a whole.