January 13, 2014

On January 16, 2014 from 2:00 to 3:00 p.m. at Medicine Hat College (MHC) in Centennial Hall, Canadian Tire Corporation will be presenting a cheque for $50,000 to MHC’s Enactus chapter in honour of recent retiree, Austin Curtin.  Curtin retired after over 30 years of experience with the company. He owned and operated several Canadian Tire locations including stores in Medicine Hat, Brooks and Cold Lake. In 1997, he won Canadian Tire’s Award of Excellence.

When asked what his response was to the announcement, Curtin said: “I was so emotional and it came out of the blue. And when the chairman of the board, Maureen Sabia said that they were donating $50,000 to the college on my behalf, I could barely believe it, but in particular, I felt blessed.”

Through support from MHC’s foundation office, Canadian Tire chose to honour Curtin by donating to Enactus. The group is a world-wide network of post-secondary students committed to using the power of entrepreneurial action to transform lives and shape a better, more sustainable world. With the support of academic and business leaders, these students are able to work on projects that focus on the triple bottom line of economic, social and environmental issues within their communities.

Enactus president, David Humphrey explained that this gift means a lot to the group as well as future entrepreneurs.

“The Enactus group is an excellent resource to get boots on the ground...so we can empower individuals abroad and within our community that are faced with poverty such as immigrants, refugees, children and others,” said Humphrey. “However, a lot of the time those efforts can be stifled from a lack of funding. Well now we are actually able to move forward, because the issue of funding has been taken off of the table with the generous funds from Canadian Tire and the matching dollars from the college.”

As a result of the donation, students involved in the group will be able to work with local organizations to try and solve challenges within the community.

Enactus is a worldwide organization, considered to be one of the best leadership development programs throughout the globe. The education that student’s receive through their involvement with the club is invaluable and can take a student far in their studies and career path.  For more information on the MHC chapter visit: www.mhc.ab.ca.

Are you a company interested in making your match at MHC? We encourage you to contact our foundation office to learn about the opportunities available to invest in our students, our college and our community. 

Learn more; contact Tracy Stroud, development officer at tstroud@mhc.ab.ca and 403.502.8997 or Jennifer Kerslake, community relations officer at jkerslake@mhc.ab.ca or 403.504.3643.