News

The University of Victoria’s School of Music will be able to keep 63 pianos ready for daily student use and put on more concerts and masterclasses thanks to a $300,000 estate gift. The new $300,000 Martha Cooke Fund was named after the late Public Archives Canada curator. UVic is Canada’s only school with all Steinway pianos and $200,000 from the fund will be used for piano maintenance.

A year after the world’s first Indigenous law degree program graduated its first class, a total of 24 new scholarships for Indigenous law students will be awarded, thanks to a group of donors and a partnership with Indspire through their Building Brighter Futures program. That means every Indigenous student joining UVic’s Faculty of Law will receive a scholarship. Last year, the average entrance scholarship for an Indigenous law student was $9,400, with several awards valued at more than $17,000.

The Audain Foundation have committed $160,000 in new funding to the Audain Professorship—including a three-year, $60,000 project specifically designed to support the Audain Professor’s efforts around outreach, community engagement and related research activities. Lindsday Katsitsakatste Delaronde is the latest Audain Professor in Contemporary Art Practice of the Pacific Northwest.

University of Victoria’s Pacific Regional Institute for Marine Energy Discovery (PRIMED) has received one of 10 million-dollar grants under the 2022 TD Ready Challenge for their solution designed to assist people and communities disproportionately affected by climate change and the transition to a low-carbon economy, TD Bank Group (TD) announced this week. PRIMED is the only recipient from British Columbia.

The University of Victoria men's basketball team is feeling extra grateful heading into the post season thanks to the generosity of Vikes alumnus Geoff McKay, whose $250,000 gift, presented at the Feb. 11 men's basketball game, is the largest single donation in program history.

Generous gift from the Kennedys’ estate brings accomplished researcher and alumnus Mark Lewis to UVic as the inaugural Gilbert and Betty Kennedy Chair in Mathematical Biology.

An unexpected and substantial legacy gift from the estate of renowned Calgarian and philanthropist Margaret (Marmie) Hess is supporting graduate and post-doctoral researchers at the University of Victoria across the sciences. The gift created a $2 million endowment to fund two graduate student awards, with the remaining $500,000 funding research grants for post-doctoral fellows.

The sprinkles returned in 2022 for another phenomenal Giving Tuesday! Thanks to tremendous support from alumni, UVic faculty and staff, sponsors and other supporters, this year’s event raised $152,261, which brings the total raised since 2016 to $728,531.

After the consumerism of Black Friday and Cyber Monday, Giving Tuesday is a day to focus on philanthropy. The University of Victoria’s Giving Tuesday initiative brings together community members, alumni, employees and students to donate to their chosen causes, participate in events (online and in-person) and unlock dollars from sponsors. The goal is to collectively raise money for a variety of programs and projects across the entire university.

Two exceptional students—one from Vancouver Island, the other from Ontario—who are planning to pursue an education in the sciences will be the latest Schulich Leaders to attend the University of Victoria in September.

A former student of the Child and Youth Care program and passionate advocate for youth in care, Lilia Zaharieva, died on June 17, 2022 at the age of 35. The Lilia Zaharieva Spirit Award for students is being established in her name.

Two humanities-based projects that put past injustices at the forefront of public conversations about equitable futures—one leading the co-creation of graphic novels by accomplished artists and survivors of mass atrocities and genocides, the other illuminating the mistreatment of people of Japanese descent in allied countries during and after the Second World War—received $5 million in federal government support to create new global connections and partnerships.

Donate to support a visiting student research fellowship for a graduate student from a Ukrainian university.

The University of Victoria Foundation announced today it has invested $25 million in the Brookfield Global Transition Fund (BGTF) with a strategy to invest in opportunities that advance and facilitate the global transition to a net-zero carbon economy. This new commitment is an infrastructure investment within the foundation’s statement of investment policy and goals and is consistent with the target to reduce the carbon intensity of all investments by 45 per cent by 2030.

University of Victoria microbiologist Caroline Cameron has received $2 million US from Open Philanthropy, the largest grant the US-based organization has given to a single Canadian university. The grant will fund Cameron’s research for developing a direct diagnostic test and vaccine for syphilis.

UVic's first Impact Week is taking place from March 14-18. There are so many acts of generosity that contribute to making UVic what it is today. Throughout Impact Week, students, staff and faculty, and community members are invited to read and reflect upon these acts, as well as take part in some events on campus!

With its colourful sprinkle theme, Giving Tuesday has become a favourite annual tradition at the university. Thanks to tremendous support from alumni, UVic faculty and staff, sponsors and other supporters, this year’s event raised $178,673, pushing the multi-year total over half a million dollars.

A $1.5-million gift from UVic political science alumnus Bruce McKean will allow the University of Victoria to establish a new research chair in Indigenous mental health. The chair will be named after the late Chief Mungo Martin, the world-renowned Kwakwaka’wakw artist who contributed so much to the creative arts which play an integral role in shifting cultural perceptions of mental health.