ROSE NOLAN SCHOLARSHIP
Supporting Indigenous Women in Post-Secondary Education
In 2018, Ted Nolan, former NHL player presented Cape Breton University with a donation of $75,000 to establish the Rose Nolan Scholarship. The gift was presented at the Cape Breton Island Golf Expereince in support of the Purdy Crawford Chair in Aboriginal Business Studies in Inverness, Nova Scotia.
The Rose Nolan scholarship was established by the Ted Nolan Foundation to assist First Nations women seeking to improve themselves through education and training.
The first scholarship was awarded to Keeshia Benard.
“My name is Keeshia Bernard from Eskasoni First Nation. I am 23 years old and a single mother to my two-year-old son. I was brought up in the same foster home all my life where, I gained three older brothers and I am the oldest of 11 children on my biological side, with 5 sisters and 5 brothers. I had recently graduated the Social Services program at Marconi Nova Scotia Community College in June 2018, where I continued on with my education and transferred my credits to Cape Breton University for the Bachelor of Arts Community Studies program. I am expected to graduated in May 2020. My education is very important to me because I just want to be able to give a life to my son that I never had and it has always been my passion to work in the social work field. In the future, I plan to apply for the one-year Social Work program at Lakehead University in Ontario and to hopefully make my dreams become a reality. I am sincerely honoured to have been selected as the recipient of the Rose Nolan Memorial Scholarship award. Thank you for your generosity, which has allowed me to focus more on my studies without having any financial worries, as I haven’t worked any job throughout my years of school and have been living off of social assistance. Receiving this award has made a very positive impact on my life.”
For more than 16 years, the Ted Nolan Foundation has been advocating for the advancement of Aborignal youth in their pursuit of education for a better future. Rose Nolan Scholarship, established in the name of Ted Nolan mother, will help First Nations women achieve their educational and training goals, while maintaining strong community involvement.
“Collectively, we need to work together and support our First Nations women through education to ensure they get the opportunities they rightly deserve so they can become tomorrow’s leaders,” said Ted Nolan, Founder of the Ted Nolan Foundation. “To work with Cape Breton Univesrity and the Purdy Crawford Chair in Aboriginal studies to establish the scholarship in my mother’s name is a great fit and I look forward to seeing the outcomes for aboriginal women at CBU.”
Pictured from left to right - CBU President David Dingwall, former NHLer, Ted Nolan and Joe Shannon, Chair of the Cape Breton Island Golf Experience.
To find out more about supporting Cape Breton University, visit www.cbu.ca/alumni