North Vancouver's Sara Eftekhar will be starting her master's degree in England next fall after receiving a fully funded academic fellowship.
Nominated for a 2015 Rotary Peace Fellowship by the Rotary Club of Lions Gate, the 25-year-old is one of four Canadians selected for the annual program, which covers fees, living and travel expenses and an applied field experience, in excess of $50,000 U.S. She says she plans to pursue her master's in international studies, peace studies and conflict resolution at the Rotary Peace Centre at the University of Bradford.
A Sutherland secondary alumnus, Eftekhar earned her undergraduate degree in nursing at UBC and currently lives in York, England, where her fiancé is going to school. She previously worked at B.C. Women's Hospital and then spent a year in Egypt creating life-skills programming for refugees with an organization funded by the United Nations Refugee Agency.
"I think it would be really interesting to combine my nursing background as well as this development degree together," Eftekhar says, explaining she hopes the advanced education helps her land a job with a large international organization such as the Red Cross or UNICEF.
Eftekhar moved to Canada from Iran when she was eight and says her parents always encouraged her to take advantage of opportunities and try to make a difference.
"If I was in Iran I wouldn't have been able to have this many opportunities to go travel, to go work in different places, to apply for a master's like this, so I'm really, really grateful to be in Canada and to have these opportunities."
Eftekhar already has a number of credits to her name, among them a Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal, a Youth Recognition Award from the City of North Vancouver and a YWCA Young Woman of Distinction Award. She is also the youngest person to be named one of Canada's Top 25 Immigrants.
