TRU receives $300k from Scotiabank to support first-year business students

KAMLOOPS — Thompson Rivers University (TRU) has received $300,000 support from Scotiabank for the next three years. The money will fund the BBA First Year Student Project.

Eliminating achievement gaps in one of TRU’s four, 10-year change goals. With the new financial support, the university believes to be one step ahead toward that direction.

“First-year students have a lot of questions and sometimes run into situations where they need academic help,” explained Dean Michael Henry. “The Scotiabank funding over the next three years is really going to be able to provide that to students. That’s really aiming on increasing student success at our first-year programs [at the Bob Gaglardi School of Business and Economics],” he said.

Along with increased funding for peer mentoring and social engagement activities, the project will also provide financial awards for first-year students in the Bachelor of Business Administration program.

Vikrant Singh, a second-year finance student, believes the initiative will encourage students to think big.

“I think [the award] will motivate the students to come up with some innovative ideas, because right now [students] are more focused on the studies and other things,” he explained.

According to TRU, this kind of academic advising is specially important for student retention. Dean Henry explained that it will make an earlier intervention possible in cases where students need academic support.

“We are going to be able to identify those students who have some challenges before they get to the end of the course. Then we can provide some extra tutoring, background material and extra support for them so we have a greater number of our students actually finishing courses very successfully,” he said.

This is the largest single gift from Scotiabank to the university. The project is another tool the school will be using to help students achieve their full potential.