Outstanding ASU students to study in Canada as Killam Fellows

Maggie LaPoint, a Barrett Honors College student majoring in business and Spanish, is one of four Arizona State University students who have won a Killam Fellowship to study in Canada for one semester during the academic year.

Administered by Fulbright Canada, the fellowship program is supported by the American Killam Trusts, Foreign Affairs, Trade & Development Canada and the Foundation for Educational Exchange between Canada and the United States. It supports the participation of undergraduate students from Canada and the United States in a program of bi-national residential exchange.

LaPoint will spend the fall 2014 semester studying public health care systems at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Alberta.

“A big part of my studies in Canada will go toward my honors thesis, centered on national public health care systems, which I will be completing upon my return to ASU,” LaPoint said, explaining what prompted her to apply for the prestigious scholarship.

“While I currently plan on working on an MPA/MBA with a more domestic focus, I am open to the experience ahead of me, and am excited to see what opportunities and interests I may gain from it,” she said.

Lindsey Kirkham, a Barrett student majoring in global health and sociology, will study at Carleton University in Ottawa, Ontario, in the fall semester, where she’ll take classes in Canadian international policy, health care, indigenous studies and French.

“Canada is a wonderful place to expand my perspective on all of my academic interests – public and global health, international relations, social justice, feminist and queer theory, and French,” Kirkham said.

Her future plans are to join the Peace Corps to do HIV/AIDS volunteer work, and to go to graduate school in global or public health.

“French language skills are very useful for international travel for global health. Canada embraces multiculturalism, especially the cultures of their First Nation communities, which is key for effective work in sociology and public health,” she added.

Emily Finn, a justice studies major will study similar subject matter at Acadia University in Nova Scotia.

"I am focusing on social and economic justice issues within the United States, so I think it will be helpful for me to study how another country handles these same issues, especially one that is so similar to the U.S. in a lot of ways and yet is also very different," she said.

Michael Kim, a Barrett student majoring in biophysics and mathematics will study at the University of Toronto in Ontario.