Pictured from Left to Right: Darren Mason, Kathy Martin (Mason), Award recipient Eden Donohoe, Rob Essery, Mike Ash and Summer Papple
Subsequent to the presentation, Summer prepared an update on Eden's commitment to aviation.
I've been keeping in touch with Eden, this year's scholarship recipient, and wanted to give you an update. Eden enjoyed attending the COPA/Sexsmith Christmas party earlier this month with her mother, Charlotte. There was a young man there who is currently in Fanshawe's aviation program and Tom Hartai introduced him to Eden so she had the opportunity to get some first-hand information about that college program. She also got to talk with Meaghan Posthumus, the guest speaker at the Christmas party, who is flying a King Air 200, primarily in Nunavut for Keewatin Air.
The next day Eden joined me at London airport to volunteer at a Girl Guides aviation badge event put on jointly by 2 aviation groups I'm a member of: The 99s and Women in Aviation International. We were stationed at the Cessna 150 walk-around so after watching the first couple of groups, Eden took over and led the Girl Guides through the exercise pointing out the parts of the plane and what each one does. There were about 20 volunteers there, including a great variety of pilots, student pilots, and highschool students interested in aviation. Eden got to talk to a 99s member who has just completed the Waterloo University aviation program, as well as others who are currently in flight training or have recently completed training.
The following day she attended the Waterloo 99s Christmas gathering and she said everyone was very welcoming and she got to meet and talk to quite a few women who have done flight training at Waterloo. She seems quite interested in both the Fanshawe and Waterloo post-secondary aviation programs. So far she has been accepted to all the college programs that she applied to but she won't hear about the university programs until the new year.
Eden has been very appreciative for being selected for the Fly the Dream Scholarship and for the connections that she's making. She is a very thoughtful and polite young woman who will be a great ambassador for our scholarship.
