April 24, 2006 Source: :
http://www.news.utoronto.ca/bin6/060424-2239.asp High school students take first steps Program helps students consider post-secondary education as a viable option
Apr 24/06
by Elizabeth Raymer (about) (email) Ahmed Azim didn't think university was in the cards for him; at most, the Grade 11 student hoped to attend community college. But a U of T program aimed at students who might not otherwise consider a post-secondary education changed his mind. When Azim was offered the chance to participate in HSBC Steps to University, which benefits select high school students considered likely to underperform or to leave school by having them complete a first-year university course, "at first it seemed like a mistake. "I wasn’t university material," said the student at Lester B. Pearson Collegiate Institute in Scarborough. "Why would they give me a university course?" However, he took the opportunity, and thanks to his success with Sociology 101, taken in conjunction with the high-school courses Business English and Introduction to Anthropology, Psychology and Sociology, "Now I know that I can go to university." On April 18, HSBC Bank Canada announced a $240,000 gift to the HSBC Steps to University program at Azim’s high school in the Malvern neighbourhood of Scarborough, which is designated as a priority area by the mayor’s panel on community safety. "The program succeeds in getting students to recognize post-secondary education as a familiar, achievable and accessible option, in part by allowing students who have not yet completed high school to obtain a university credit," President David Naylor said at the event. HSBC Steps to University is administered by U of T’s Transitional Year Program in partnership with the Toronto District School Board. The program is currently offered in eight Toronto high schools and in the Regent Park neighbourhood. The new gift continues HSBC Bank Canada’s support of the program for another three years and will allow Steps to University to be offered in two new schools beginning in 2006-2007. Toronto mayor David Miller commended the partnership U of T had developed with HSBC Bank Canada, Toronto’s public school board and the City of Toronto. The city wanted to ensure that every student had a chance to continue their education, said the mayor. As the child of a widowed immigrant mother who worked three jobs, he himself benefited from scholarships. Azim is also the child of immigrant parents; they attended community college but not university. He said the Steps to University course has "shown me what hard work is" and given him "a taste" of what to expect from university in terms of the pressure, deadlines and responsibility for keeping up with readings and understanding the text on one’s own. Now, Azim hopes to study business management at U of T, York University or McMaster University. HSBC Steps to University was launched in 1992 and 188 students are enrolled in the program this year. More than 150 students of the hundreds who have completed the program have continued on to study at U of T.
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