NANAIMO – The desire to win combined with the desire to change lives turned out to be a magic combination for four Vancouver Island University (VIU) MBA students, who recently won the Canadian Bureau for International Education (CBIE) Elizabeth Paterson Award for positive contributions to global citizenship and internationalization.
VIU MBA students Dominik Beckers of Germany, Lukas Zimmermann of Switzerland, Ufuoma Lira Muoboghare of Nigeria and Nneka Otogbolu, also of Nigeria, received the award for their work on and participation in the first-ever National MBA Games hosted on the West Coast.
While Beckers, Zimmerman and Muoboghare were on the organizing committee for the national event, which brought 600 MBA candidates, professors and dignitaries from 19 Canadian universities to Nanaimo last January, Otogbolu led the winning team.
The VIU-hosted Games set a fundraising record, collecting a $300,000 in donations to support the anti-violence Moose Hide campaign, which is a grassroots movement of Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal men who stand against violence towards women and children.
While the games are becoming a fond memory now, the award recognizing those monumental efforts remind the winners of what they accomplished and learned.
VIU’s international MBA program is robust, drawing students from more than 40 countries around the world, annually.
Knowing there were so many international students participating in the Games, the committee decided to turn the event into a learning opportunity about Canada’s relationship and history with Indigenous people.
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