Faye Sobey worked in a research lab one summer when she was a student at Dalhousie. It was an experience not to be missed. And, thanks to a $1-million gift from the David and Faye Sobey Foundation, more students will get to have the same opportunity.

The Faye Sobey Student Undergraduate Research Endowment will fund up to 10 additional research positions for undergraduate science students each summer, in perpetuity. It will provide grants of about $5,000 to students in disciplines across the Faculty of Science.

Undergraduate research experience is important to a well-rounded education. “There’s absolutely no substitute for it. It inspires students to go into research and make it their career,” says Chris Moore, dean of the Faculty of Science, describing the new endowment as “fantastic.”

When Mrs. Sobey graduated from Dalhousie in 1953 with a major in biochemistry, she was one of only 55 science students – only 14 of them female. Today the Faculty has approximately 3,000 undergraduate students – and the male-female ratio is practically even.

“It is my hope that by creating a new research endowment, many more deserving students are afforded the same opportunity that I was so fortunate to have received,” Mrs. Sobey said during a luncheon organized to celebrate her gift.