English professor Roy Miki, winner of the Governor-General's Literary Award for poetry, was recognized with three major awards in 2006 for his significant contributions to the Japanese Canadian redress movement. The outspoken author of Redress: Inside the Japanese Canadian Call for Justice received the Order of Canada, the Nora and Ted Sterling Prize in Support of Controversy, and the Thakore Foundation Award.

SFU alumna Jennifer Allen Simons announced that her Simons Foundation would help SFU's new School for International Studies find “new ways of furthering a humane life for all” by funding a visiting chair in dialogue on international law and human security. Visiting chair holders — “those who have dedicated their lives to the cause of furthering international law and human rights” — will spend up to a year at SFU, teaching and stimulating public debate on complex international issues.

The YMCA Power of Peace awards saluted SFU doctoral candidate and former Student Society president Clement Abas Apaak as an international peacebuilder for his efforts to raise public awareness of the humanitarian crisis in Darfur, Sudan. The founder of Canadian Students for Darfur, a fundraising and social justice organization now active on 16 Canadian campuses, Apaak “stands for advocacy, human rights, equality and the power of students to change the world.”

The Faculty of Health Sciences’ new Global Health program accepted its first graduate students in 2006. The program, unique in Canada, prepares students to work in the global arena with a particular focus on health issues faced by low- and middle-income countries. During an international practicum, students will gain first-hand experience at sites coordinated by universities in India, China, Mongolia and Mexico.