No students have applied for the Syrian refugee tuition relief that has been available since Sept. 2015.
“At this time I am not aware of any refugees who have come forward yet,” said Sara Grainger, president of the Student’s Association, on Jan. 13.
“It’s still relatively early in the game. A good number of refugees only just arrived prior to Christmas. So its safe to assume that they are taking care of some of their fundamental needs first,” said Laura Stanbra, vice president of Student Services.
Despite the delay in applicants, several steps are still being taken to ensure that information about the fund is accessible.
Frontline staff at the Financial Aid and the registrar’s offices, as well as student success specialists, have been trained about the fund in case they get any direct inquiries for information.
The Algonquin College Foundation has also been staying in close contact with broader community efforts, such as Refugee613, an organization that “communicates about refugee issues and helps the public connect to settlement and others agencies with partners who hold the expertise,” said Louisa Taylor from the organization.
The volunteer bureau at the AC Hub is also looking into volunteer opportunities for students to get involved in the community to help with refugee efforts.
Cheryl Jensen, president of Algonquin, announced the college’s commitment to helping with the ongoing Syrian refugee crisis with the fund at the end of Sept. 2015. “We immediately started talking about what this crisis means for Algonquin,” said Jensen in a previous interview with the Algonquin Times.
The Algonquin College Foundation, a charitable subsidiary of the College, pledged up to $50,000 for refugees seeking to study at the college.
Following this announcement, the Algonquin Students’ Association Board then pledged an additional $10,000 to go towards the fund.
“We thought the best thing for us to do is to do what we do best – to help provide education,” said Stanbra of Student Services. “We really feel like we are living up to the college values of caring, learning, integrity, and respect.”
The funds will be available to any full or part-time refugee student to cover the costs of tuition, necessary pre-requisites courses, or language training at the college.
“They are often on our minds,” said Stanbra, “and we are looking forward to the opportunity when we have students here that are utilizing these funds.”