Fall 2019 honorary doctorates recognized for leadership in law, business, social impact

At Ryerson’s fall 2019 convocation, Judge Maryka Omatsu and award-winning entrepreneur Sajjad Ebrahim will receive honorary doctorates for their exemplary work – Omatsu, as a trailblazer in the Canadian justice system and Ebrahim, as a leading business owner and dedicated philanthropist.

Omatsu will receive the honour on Oct. 16, and Ebrahim will be recognized on Oct. 17.

Ryerson bestows honorary degrees to those who have made extraordinary contributions to the Ryerson community, Canadian society and humanity around the world.

Below, a glimpse into the extraordinary accomplishments of Omatsu and Ebrahim.

Judge Maryka Omatsu

Doctor of Laws, honoris causa
Oct. 16 at 10:30 a.m.

Maryka Omatsu was named to the Ontario Court of Justice in 1993, becoming the first woman of East Asian heritage to be appointed a judge in Canada. Her previous positions included lawyer, instructor and chair for the Ontario Human Rights Appeals’ Tribunal.  

Omatsu played a key role in achieving redress for the internment of Japanese Canadians during the Second World War. In the 1980s, she served as legal counsel for the National Association of Japanese Canadians (NAJC) and was a member of the organization’s strategy and negotiation team.  

She documented that journey in her 1992 award-winning book Bittersweet Passage: Redress and the Japanese Canadian Experience. Her short film, Swimming Upstream (external link) , which details the Japanese Canadian community’s case against the British Columbia government, was recently screened in Toronto. It received two honorable mentions and the Making a Difference Award at the Commffest Global Community Film & Arts Festival.

A member of the Order of Ontario, Omatsu is the inaugural recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Federation of Asian Canadian Lawyers. In 2013, she became the first Canadian to receive the Trailblazer Award from the United States-based National Asian Pacific Bar Association.  

Last year, Omatsu was named to the special advisory council of the Canadian Race Relations Foundation. She also was appointed co-chair of NAJC’s BC redress community consultations.

Sajjad Ebrahim

Doctor of Laws, honoris causa
Oct. 17 10:30 a.m.

Sajjad Ebrahim holds a bachelor of commerce from Karachi University and a master of business administration from Columbia University. In 1977, he immigrated to Canada and bought Par Pak Limited, a 20-employee company that manufactured plastic food containers. In 2013, when Ebrahim sold Par Pak, it had 900 employees across Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom, and its annual revenue topped $200 million.

Ebrahim has received several awards during his career, including the 1993 Canada Award of Business Excellence in the entrepreneur category, and both the 2008 Leader of the Year and 2016 Lifetime Achievement awards from the Canadian Plastic Industry Association. Today, he runs his family’s office, is a member of the board of overseers for Columbia Business School and supports causes, both in Canada and overseas, through the International Development and Relief Foundation.

He is the founder and president of the board of directors for Crescent Village, a not-for-profit housing complex in Richmond Hill, and is the principal supporter of The Society for the Prevention and Cure of Blindness in Pakistan. The organization performs more than 60,000 cataract surgeries annually in the country's impoverished rural areas.

Ebrahim has sponsored 20 Syrian refugee families through Ryerson University and has helped to raise $1 million for Brampton Civic Hospital. In 2015, he donated $2.5 million to the urgent care centre at Peel Memorial Centre for Integrated Health and Wellness, the largest individual gift made to the William Osler Health System Foundation.                                              

Learn more about Ryerson’s fall convocation, taking place Oct. 16 and 17.