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Iqaluit grad gets $75,000 scholarship

Daniel T'seleie
Northern News Services

Iqaluit (July 11/05) - On a Tuesday morning the easiest way to get in touch with Ashley Tufts is to wait at the library in Iqaluit for her to finish her volunteer work reading to pre-school children.



Ashley Tufts of Iqaluit has received a Canadian Merit Scholarship worth $75,000 towards her university education. She got the scholarship because of her academic performance at Inuksuk high school, and for her strength of character.


Her urge to help others is just one quality that helped earn her a Canadian Merit Scholarship worth $75,000 over four years towards her university education.

Of 2,900 applicants only 70 were chosen, including Tufts, to travel to Toronto for an in-person interview. Thirty of these finalists were granted scholarships of varying amounts: $75,000 is the most the Canadian Merit Scholarship Foundation awards.

Aside from scholastic performance, the foundation judges individuals on their character, intellect and entrepreneurial skills.

There is a certain amount of pressure that comes with the scholarship: her eligibility will be re-evaluated after each school year.

"It's kind of scary knowing you have to be able to keep an 85 per cent average (at university to keep the scholarship)," said Tufts.

Bright future

Scholarship winners can only attend certain schools across Canada. Tufts wanted to attend the University of British Columbia because B.C. is one of two Canadian provinces the well-travelled Tufts has not visited.

So when the university contacted her and asked her to attend it seemed like fate.

She had second thoughts, though and said she "just wouldn't feel comfortable" at the large, Vancouver campus.

When the university sent a package informing her of the new Okanagan Campus in Kelowna, she knew immediately it was for her.

She plans on studying international relations at the school.

"I love travelling around the world," said Tufts.

Tufts will visit Iceland and Greenland later this month for a conference on the Kyoto Protocol. She has also been accepted into a Cross-cultural Solutions program, which only accepts two applicants internationally each year. That will take her to Tanzania next May to work with youth who have lost parents to HIV and AIDS.

"That's what I feel like I should be doing, helping people," Tufts said.