Four local high school students were awarded the prestigious James Hillier Foundation Scholarship during an event on Thursday, June 12, 2025.
The Foundation first started awarding the scholarships back in 1997 and since then, it has provided over $1,500,000 to local students who wish to pursue a career in scientific research.
In total, the scholarship has now assisted 90 students with their four-year undergraduate degrees.
Peter Dennis, the Scholarship Selection Committee Chair, said that each year, the local high schools get to refer up to two students.
“The schools themselves each have their own little system for identifying and choosing the students they refer to us. The students have to have their principal’s written permission to apply and then they do so through our website,” he said. “ We at the Foundation go through them all and we typically choose six out of a potential 12 students for the interview process, however this year we had a bit of a difficult time choosing so we interviewed seven.”
Dennis said that it’s never quite easy choosing who makes it through to the interview stage, but that the committee tries to honour the qualities Dr. James Hillier valued when he was still alive and part of the selection committee.
“When you look at what the qualifications are, all of them are truly good candidates who really deserve something,” he said. “When Dr. Hillier was still part of the Foundation and the selection committee, he would drive up for the interviews to partake in the process, and so we try to keep some of his thoughts and feelings about what kind of students we’re looking for, alive in that sense. We’re always looking for students who have a passion for science and have shown either an interest, or an ability to do research, and so we combine all of those things together to kind of narrow it down.”
This year’s scholarship winners were: Nickolas Barandich from Paris District High School, Mohid Khan and Shriyak Kashyap from Assumption College School, and Cuba Pucci from Brantford Collegiate Institute and Vocational School.
While the maximum grant total used to be $20,000, this year the amount was raised and each of the students will now receive $7,000 per year, to be used to cover general academic fees. This brings the total grant up to a potential $28,000 per student.
“For years we were offering three scholarships, but we were able to build up the fund of money so that we can support four now,” said Dennis. “We were also able to give the students who didn’t get the scholarship, $1,000 each.
During the awards ceremony, Peter Giordano, Chair of the James Hillier Foundation, spoke about James Hillier’s career path and accomplishments, while Steward McLellan, one of the 1999 scholarship recipients, discussed his journey from high school to undergraduate degree, and his current post-graduate work.
Kimberly De Jong’s reporting is funded by the Canadian government through its Local Journalism Initiative.The funding allows her to report rural and agricultural stories from Blandford-Blenheim and Brant County. Reach her at kimberly.dejong@brantbeacon.ca.
