According to Alstom, this support will take the form of a donation of C$250,000 to the University’s “Choosing to Change the Future” Great Campaign, spread over several initiatives, including:
- “Creating science content accessible to a large public, as well as activities to mobilize and raise awareness around climate change for a wide audience, including a section specifically dedicated to young people.
- “Teaching and research, by funding design projects, various student initiatives, educational and scientific activities, as well as events such as the ‘Createk’ Competition, lunchtime lectures and the student mentoring program.
- “Attracting new students to career paths in engineering and law, particularly for women through the ‘Génie au féminin’ scholarship program.
- “Conducting activities designed to educate students about Alstom as a local employer and career pathways in the rail industry as a sector of the future, both within the Faculty of Engineering and elsewhere on campus.”
Through this partnership, which joins other strategic partnerships Alstom has forged with other local higher education institutions, the company says it is “strengthening its presence in the Quebec and Canadian innovation ecosystem.” The University’s initiatives, specifically those in collaboration with the “Centre de technologies avancées de Sherbrooke” and its laboratories, “bring a very concrete dimension to experiential learning, by encouraging entrepreneurship and the emergence of Quebec companies,” the company noted.
“Our rail mobility professions require, today more than ever, cutting-edge expertise in many technological fields and highly qualified resources. We rely on institutions such as the Université de Sherbrooke to train graduates who know how to meet our challenges,” said Michael Keroullé, President of Alstom Americas. “Alstom employs more than 1,000 engineers in Canada, a large number of whom work in Montérégie, Quebec, where the University also has a campus. Many Université de Sherbrooke graduates now hold senior positions at Alstom, which attests to the high quality of the training provided there. We are delighted to invest in our community and support the talented Sherbrooke students who will become the engineers, scientists, lawyers, and managers of tomorrow.”
“On behalf of my fellow deans of the Faculty of Arts and Humanities and the Faculty of Law, I would like to thank Alstom for this generous gesture, which demonstrates our deep commitment to training the next generation of students and to university research,” said Professor Jean Proulx, Dean of the UdeS Faculty of Engineering. “Thanks to this support, our students will be able to develop their full potential in even more stimulating and innovative environments. We are very grateful to be able to count on a partner so committed to our mission.”
