TORONTO, October 15, 2019 – 91ŃÇÉ« will award honorary degrees at Fall Convocation to four remarkable individuals whose talent and hard work have enriched the arts, business, media, the environment and the field of human rights advocacy.

“These four individuals each have found success in very different fields, possess unique gifts and have developed their own leadership styles. But they all share one important quality: they have used their talents to go beyond their chosen careers and contribute to the public good, whether through environmentalism, advocacy, or education,” said Rhonda L. Lenton, president and vice-chancellor of 91ŃÇÉ«.

More than 2,400 graduates will cross the stage at six , from Wednesday, October 16 to Friday, October 18. Most ceremonies will be held at the Convocation Pavilion, Aviva Centre, located at 1 Shoreham Drive, on the west side of the Keele campus (See ). The Kellogg-Schulich Executive MBA ceremony will take place in the McEwen Auditorium, Seymour Schulich Building which is also located at Keele campus (see ).

Below are the honorary degree recipients in order of the Faculty ceremonies at which they will be honoured:

Steven Campbell, entrepreneur and environmentalist
Honorary Doctor of Laws
Schulich School of Business, Glendon College, Osgoode Hall Law School
Wednesday, October 16, 2019, 3:30 p.m.

Steven Campbell, president of Lifford Wine and Spirits, is an industry leader recognized for his company’s portfolio, integrity, professionalism, philanthropy, and social and environmental responsibility. He has traveled the four corners of the world seeking out and helping artisanal wine families to bring their wines to Canada.

Campbell attended 91ŃÇÉ« during the 1970s, and started his career as a restauranteur, initially running the student coffee shop at Calumet College, purchasing a small restaurant with other 91ŃÇÉ« students in 1978, and eventually becoming a sommelier and wine bar owner in 1985.

In 1994, Campbell sold the Delisle Wine Bar to buy Lifford Wine Agency. Under his leadership, Lifford grew from a small Ontario-based company to one of the largest independent national wine and spirits distributorships in Canada. Campbell and Lifford have championed environmental causes with sustained corporate citizenship and a Zero-Carbon footprint. Lifford Wine & Spirits was honoured in 2007 with Tree Canada’s Eterne Award for environmental stewardship and has received several Elsie Awards from the Liquor Control Board of Ontario for creativity, innovation and social responsibility.  Partnering with Tree Canada since 2005, Lifford has planted more than 90,000 trees, and raised over $3 million to support the environment, disaster relief efforts, children’s mental health, health research, and the arts.

Margot Franssen, entrepreneur and advocate for women and girls
Honorary Doctor of Law
Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies
Thursday, October 17, 10:30 a.m.

Margot Franssen is founder, former president and partner of The Body Shop Canada, which opened in 1980 and grew to become one of Canada’s best-known brands. The company raised $1.3 million in support of a campaign against gender-based violence during her tenure. The Body Shop Canada also supported employees in performing  192,000 hours of community work in women’s shelters during work hours.

Franssen was named an Officer of the Order of Canada in 2002 and received the Queen’s Diamond and Golden Jubilee Award. In 2003, she sold her company to The Body Shop International and continued her advocacy work for women and girls.

Her recent advocacy includes co-chairing the National Task Force on Sex Trafficking of Canadian Girls and co-founding The Canadian Centre to End Human Trafficking.

Franssen has received many awards including The United Nations Development Fund for Women Canada Award, Top 25 Women of Influence in Canada, Twenty-One Leaders for the Twenty First Century, and The International Alliance for Women World of Difference 100 award.

An alumna of 91ŃÇÉ« (BA ’79), Franssen has served on many philanthropic and private sector boards, including 91ŃÇɫ’s Board of Governors (1991 to 2003). She co-chaired a successful fundraising campaign at 91ŃÇÉ« and, along with her husband Quig Tingley, who was her partner at The Body Shop, established an endowed scholarship for undergraduate students in financial need.

Dionne Brand, poet, novelist, essayist and public intellectual
Honorary Doctor of Letters
Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies and School of the Arts, Media, Performance & Design
Thursday, October 17, 3:30 p.m.

Dionne Brand is a renowned poet, novelist, and essayist. She is a major and singular voice in Canadian writing whose work is notable for the beauty of its language and for its intense engagement with issues of social justice. Brand is a writer ±đ˛Ô˛µ˛ą˛µĂ©, whose work is insistently political, formally beautiful and precise.

A former Poet Laureate of Toronto (2009-2012) Brand has published eleven volumes of poetry, six books of fiction and two non-fiction works.

Over more than four decades of writing, Brand has received many awards, including: the Governor General’s Award for poetry and the Trillium Book Award for Land to Light On (1997); the Pat Lowther Award for poetry for thirsty; the Trillium Book Award for The Blue Clerk (2019); the Griffin Poetry Prize for Ossuaries; the Toronto Book Award for What We All Long For (2006) and Theory (2019); and the Harbourfront Festival Prize in recognition of her important contributions to literature. In 2017 she was named to the Order of Canada. Brand is a professor in the School of English and Theatre Studies at the University of Guelph where she teaches Creative Writing and Literature.

Trina McQueen, broadcast media trailblazer
Honorary Doctor of Laws
Schulich School of Business
Friday, October 18, 2:30 p.m.

Trina McQueen has shaped Canada's media landscape in journalism and programming. She has broken the glass ceiling in both the public and private sector, starting as the first female host of CTV’s W-5, rising to become the first woman in North America to head a national news service, at CBC. There she launched the country's first all-news channel, now CBC News Network. Later, she moved to the private sector, where she launched Canada's Discovery Channel which was the first Canadian network to develop its own website. Later, as president and chief operating officer of CTV, she participated in a major expansion of that network and in its sale to BCE.

She become 91ŃÇÉ«'s first Visiting Professor in Broadcast Management in 2008. In that role, and as adjunct professor, she has developed and co-developed new courses for the Arts, Media and Entertainment Management Program. She is now co-director of that program and also the Bell Media Professor of Media Management. Her mission has been to develop strong relationships between the Schulich School of Business and the media industry.

In recognition of her services to broadcasting, she was made an Officer of the Order of Canada in 2005. She is a member of the CBC News Hall of Fame, the Playback Movie and Television Hall of Fame, and an honorary member of the Directors Guild of Canada. She has also received the Canadian Journalism Foundation Award of Excellence, and the Academy Achievement Gemini.

91ŃÇÉ« champions new ways of thinking that drive teaching and research excellence. Our students receive the education they need to create big ideas that make an impact on the world. Meaningful and sometimes unexpected careers result from cross-disciplinary programming, innovative course design and diverse experiential learning opportunities. 91ŃÇÉ« students and graduates push limits, achieve goals and find solutions to the world’s most pressing social challenges, empowered by a strong community that opens minds. 91ŃÇÉ« U is an internationally recognized research university – our 11 faculties and 25 research centres have partnerships with 200+ leading universities worldwide. Located in Toronto, 91ŃÇÉ« is the third largest university in Canada, with a strong community of 53,000 students, 7,000 faculty and administrative staff, and more than 300,000 alumni.

91ŃÇÉ« U's fully bilingual Glendon Campus is home to Southern Ontario's Centre of Excellence for French Language and Bilingual Postsecondary Education.

Media Contact: Janice Walls, 91ŃÇÉ« Media Relations, 416-455-4710, wallsj@yorku.ca

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TORONTO, October 18, 2016 – 91ŃÇÉ« will confer honorary degrees at this fall’s convocation ceremonies to two exceptional Canadians: a sports visionary and philanthropic superstar as well as a financial leader, Paul Beeston and an education and health services advocate and champion of Japanese-Canadian culture, Janice Fukakusa.

“Paul Beeston and Janice Fukakusa have been trailblazers in their respective fields, each possessing a strong sense of community spirit and drive that extends to the remarkable work they do to give back to their communities through volunteer service and philanthropy,” said 91ŃÇÉ« President and Vice-Chancellor Mamdouh Shoukri. “We are delighted to honour these Toronto civic leaders and I know they will be a great inspiration to our graduating students as they set out to make their own impact.”

Convocation ceremonies will be held from Wednesday, Oct. 19 to Friday, Oct. 21. The includes a full schedule of all ceremonies. All ceremonies will take place at the Convocation Pavilion, located at the Aviva Centre, 1 Shoreham Drive, at 91ŃÇɫ’s Keele campus (#8 on the ), except for Friday's ceremony, which will take place at the Seymour Schulich Building.

Here are the recipients in order of the Faculty ceremonies at which they will be honoured:

– Sports visionary and philanthropist
Honorary Doctor of Laws
Glendon College and Faculty of Health
Wednesday, Oct. 19, 10:30am

Beeston is one of Canada’s most celebrated sports leaders. Over the past four decades, he has played a principal role in shaping baseball in Canada. In 1976, he was hired as the Toronto Blue Jays’ first employee. He fulfilled progressively senior roles at the organization, culminating in president and chief executive officer, titles which he held until his 2015 retirement. During his tenure with the Jays, he was instrumental in guiding the team to two World Series wins.

From 1997 to 2002, he took a hiatus from the Jays to serve as president and chief operating officer of Major League Baseball. He currently serves on the board of the National Baseball Hall of Fame. He was made a member of the Order of Canada in 1998, and he has been inducted into both the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame (2002) and Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame (2005). In 2008, his name was added to the Blue Jays’ Level of Excellence at the Rogers Centre. In recognition of his peerless contributions to the Blue Jays franchise, he was appointed president emeritus in 2016. Mayor John Tory presented Beeston a key to the city of Toronto on September 28th of this year.

Beeston has distinguished himself as a philanthropist, giving to diverse causes, including the Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital, where the Beeston Cup in wheelchair hockey was a much-anticipated annual event. He has also served as chair and member of the board of trustees for the Centre for Addiction & Mental Health (CAMH), director of the Blue Jays Care Foundation and board member of Huron University College at the University of Western Ontario. He has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Western Ontario.

– Financial leader, education and health services advocate and champion of Japanese-Canadian culture
Honorary Doctor of Laws
Schulich School of Business
Friday, Oct. 21, 9am

91ŃÇÉ« alumna Janice Fukakusa (MBA 1979) is changing the face of women in the financial sector. She is chief administrative officer and chief financial officer of the Royal Bank of Canada (RBC), Canada’s largest banking institution. Since joining RBC in 1985, she has worked in positions across the organization’s many sectors. She has a bachelor of arts from the University of Toronto and master of business administration from the Schulich School of Business. Before RBC, Fukakusa worked at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, where she achieved her chartered professional accountant and chartered business valuator designations.

Her numerous professional accolades include being inducted into Canada's Most Powerful Women Hall of Fame, selected as Canada’s CFO of the Year (2014), named a fellow of the Institute of Chartered Professional Accountants of Ontario and chosen as one of the 25 Most Powerful Women in Banking by American Banker magazine for four consecutive years.

A child of Japanese immigrants interned in camps in Canada during the Second World War, Fukakusa holds her Japanese-Canadian identity close to her heart. As an active member of the Japanese Canadian Culture Centre, she has assumed a leading role as a cultural and fundraising advocate. She also serves on several not-for-profit organizations, including Ryerson University, the Princess Margaret Cancer Foundation, Wellspring Cancer Support and the Schulich School of Business. She facilitated RBC’s $2-million gift toward the school’s Centre for Global Enterprise in 2011 and is currently a member of the Dean’s Advisory Council. In 2013, she received both Schulich’s Alumni Recognition Award for Outstanding Public Contribution and a Bryden Alumni Award for Pinnacle Achievement.

is known for championing new ways of thinking that drive teaching and research excellence. Our students receive the education they need to create big ideas that make an impact on the world. Meaningful and sometimes unexpected careers result from cross-discipline programming, innovative course design and diverse experiential learning opportunities. 91ŃÇÉ« students and graduates push limits, achieve goals and find solutions to the world’s most pressing social challenges, empowered by a strong community that opens minds. 91ŃÇÉ« U is an internationally recognized research university – our 11 faculties and 26 research centres have partnerships with 200+ leading universities worldwide. Located in Toronto, 91ŃÇÉ« is the third largest university in Canada, with a strong community of 53,000 students, 7,000 faculty and administrative staff, and more than 295,000 alumni.
91ŃÇÉ« U's fully bilingual Glendon campus is home to Southern Ontario's Centre of Excellence for French Language and Bilingual Postsecondary Education.

Media contact:
Gloria Suhasini, 91ŃÇÉ« Media Relations, 416 736 2100 ext. 22094, suhasini@yorku.ca

The post Former Blue Jays president and champion of Japanese culture in Canada to receive honorary degrees at 91ŃÇÉ« fall convocation appeared first on News@91ŃÇÉ«.