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From education and health care, to research and leadership, the recipients of the 2026 ÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ President's Award for Excellence in Student Leadership are truly at the top of their class.

This week, Muhammad Faeez Ansari, Tracy Dinh, Douye Igoniderigha and Sunand Kannappan will receive the highest honour awarded to graduating students in recognition of outstanding leadership and academic achievement. Through advocacy, innovation, mentorship and expanding access to opportunity, they have strengthened institutions, empowered communities and created new pathways for success. 

Muhammad Faeez Ansari

Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering with a minor in Biomedical Engineering from the Schulich School of Engineering 

Muhammad Faeez Ansari has built his leadership around a simple idea: Meaningful innovation happens when students are given opportunities to collaborate across disciplines and communities. Through engineering design, health innovation, mentorship and student-wellness advocacy, he has created initiatives that have expanded experiential learning and strengthened support systems across the ÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ. 

Graduating from the (SSE) with a degree in mechanical engineering, Muhammad combined academic excellence with a sustained commitment to interdisciplinary collaboration and community impact. 

As founder and president of the ), he grew the organization to more than 85 students across nine interdisciplinary sub-teams spanning engineering, science, health sciences, business, and nursing. He secured more than $60,000 in funding and in-kind support while leading collaborations with the , , , and the in Edmonton. Beyond project development, he established onboarding systems, project workflows, procurement processes, and safety structures that transformed BMERIT into a sustainable experiential-learning platform for future students. 

Recognizing the need for national collaboration in biomedical engineering, Muhammad later co-founded , a cross-Canada initiative connecting biomedical engineering design teams, researchers, and industry leaders from more than 15 institutions. His entrepreneurial leadership also translated into healthcare innovation through a modular biosensor platform focused on biomarkers associated with neurodegenerative disease, which became a finalist in the Hunter Hub for Entrepreneurial Thinking's Launchpad Pitch Competition and received the People’s Choice Award. 

Alongside his work in innovation, Muhammad has played a significant role in advancing student wellness and inclusive community support. As project lead of the Engineering Student Wellness Initiative, built in collaboration with the SSE Mental Health & Wellness Committee, , and faculty leadership, the initiative was designed to be sustainable and replicable for future student leaders. He also supported multiple cohorts of refugee students through the Student Refugee Program at the SSE, helping students navigate academic, professional and personal transitions to university life in Canada. 

His leadership extends into national competitions, research and community outreach. Muhammad served as competition director for the Innovative Design Competition at the Canadian Engineering Competition hosted by UÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ, and contributed to public health outreach through . He has also participated in advocacy focused on accessibility and disability representation. 

Muhammad’s academic achievements further reflect the breadth of his contributions. He earned consistent placement on the Dean’s List, is a member of the Scholars Academy, and has contributed to research spanning imaging, machine learning and robotics. He is the co-author of research published in the American Journal of Neuroradiology, and has presented his work at local and national conferences. 

Throughout his time at UÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ, Muhammad has approached leadership as an opportunity to create systems that empower others. Whether building biomedical innovation platforms, expanding student wellness supports, or strengthening inclusive community networks, his work reflects a commitment to collaboration, sustainability and meaningful institutional impact. 

Tracy Dinh

Bachelor of Education (Honours) from the Werklund School of Education 

For Tracy Dinh, leadership has centred on building educational spaces where students feel supported, represented and empowered to succeed. Through student governance, wellness advocacy and community-engaged research, she has shaped lasting institutional change within the and across the broader UÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ community. 

Graduating with an Honours Bachelor of Education, Tracy combined academic excellence with a strong record of advocacy, research and student leadership focused on educator well-being, accessibility, equity and strengthening the student experience. As president of the and education representative to the UÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ , she represented education students across nine university councils and committees, contributing to practicum reform, academic policy discussions, and initiatives focused on student well-being and accessibility. Her advocacy helped integrate wellness and social-emotional learning into teacher preparation, reinforcing the importance of educator well-being within professional training. 

Tracy's leadership also resulted in tangible improvements to student spaces and learning environments. As lead author of a successful proposal, Tracy secured $75,600 in funding to redesign a shared Werklund study space using inclusive design principles, improving accessibility and functionality for students within the faculty. 

Tracy has contributed to more than nine faculty-led research projects across the Werklund School, reflecting a sustained commitment to research-informed practice. In response to concerns surrounding burnout among pre-service teachers, she expanded the #FieldSelfCareStreak initiative across seven Alberta institutions and co-led the first Practicum Wellness Fair focused on educator mental health and well-being. She later advanced this work as Co-Principal Investigator of Designing for Wellness: Optimizing Social Media Engagement to Promote Long-Term Teacher Wellbeing Among Pre-Service Teachers, a funded and published research project examining how digital well-being practices can better support future educators. 

Tracy has also demonstrated a sustained commitment to reconciliation-focused and community-engaged work. As a research assistant on , Tracy contributed to projects supporting the integration of Indigenous literature into K-12 classrooms and directly engaged more than 250 students and educators through workshops, conferences and community programming. As a Senior Werklund Undergraduate Ambassador, she also designed Concurrent Connect, a mentorship and transition program supporting education students in building community and navigating their academic journey. 

Outside the university, Tracy has channelled that same commitment into community advocacy and youth engagement. As co-founder of , she helped develop programming reaching more than 700 youth on trauma-informed practice, consent education and mental health awareness. Through her leadership with the ÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ Vietnamese Association for Encouragement of Learning, she supported scholarship initiatives, tutoring expansion, and programs serving immigrant and refugee families in ÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ, including helping provide more than 300 scholarships to Vietnamese youth. 

Tracy’s academic and leadership contributions have been recognized through numerous distinctions, including being named one of . She graduated with a Bachelor of Education (Honours in Education) with a focus on critical media discourse analysis and anti-racism curriculum and policy, and achieved a 4.0 GPA in her final year of study. 

Throughout her time at UÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ, Tracy has approached leadership through collaboration, care and systems-level advocacy. Her work has strengthened institutional supports for students, advanced conversations around educator well-being, and created more inclusive learning communities for future generations of students and educators. 

Douye Igoniderigha

Bachelor of Science in Natural Sciences with a minor in African Studies 

Douye Igoniderigha has become a leading advocate for equity, research accessibility, and community-building at UÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ. Through initiatives focused on mentorship, educational access and systemic change, his work has expanded opportunities for students from historically under-represented communities across campus and beyond. 

Graduating with a Bachelor of Science in natural sciences with a minor in African studies, Douye combined academic excellence with leadership in research, advocacy and student engagement. In 2024, he was selected for the Scholars Academy in recognition of his academic excellence, interdisciplinary leadership, and community engagement. His scholarly work spans public health, education and systems equity, including qualitative research examining vaccine hesitancy among at the . His research contributions earned distinctions including first place at UÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ’s competition and recognition through a national Youth Incubator Challenge focused on climate justice research. 

Douye is the co-founder of the Black Science Student Network and initiatives that have expanded access to mentorship, research opportunities, scholarships, faculty mentorship and professional-development resources for under-represented students in STEM. One of his most significant institutional contributions came through the co-creation of the securing $350,000 in funding through a successful Quality Money proposal supporting Black students facing financial barriers to continuing their education. 

Douye also played a national leadership role through his four-year involvement with the UÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ Chapter, progressing from vice-president events to co-president. Through workshops, mentorship initiatives and summer research programming, he helped expand undergraduate research access for students across Canada. Under his leadership, the organization distributed more than $56,000 in funding to support students historically excluded from research participation. 

As a recipient of the 3M National Student Fellowship, Douye led a cross-Canada research initiative examining equity, accessibility and opportunity in higher education. He also contributed to the development of Navigating University: A Student Manual, a student-focused resource now used at post-secondary institutions across Canada, and delivered a plenary address at the conference focused on equity-centred educational reform. 

Beyond research and advocacy, Douye invested deeply in community-building initiatives supporting Black, African, newcomer and refugee students at UÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ. Through his work with the , he helped expand the into a major campus event welcoming hundreds of students and community members over multiple years, strengthening spaces for cultural connection, representation and belonging within the university community. 

This fall, Douye will pursue a fully funded Master of Science in Family Medicine at McGill University as a recipient of the McCall MacBain Finalist Award and a Graduate Excellence Award before continuing into medical school as a Medavie Scholar. His work reflects a sustained commitment to improving equity, access and representation within health care and higher education systems. 

Sunand Kannappan

Doctor of Medicine from the Cumming School of Medicine 

For Sunand Kannappan, leadership has meant identifying gaps in systems and building practical, scalable solutions that continue creating impact long after their launch. Across health care, education, technology and public policy, his work has consistently focused on strengthening how people access care, mentorship and opportunity. 

Graduating from the (CSM), Sunand has distinguished himself through a combination of systems thinking, entrepreneurial leadership, academic achievement and public impact. At the national level, he was the only medical student appointed to the , where he contributed to recommendations shaping health-care modernization in Canada and informing broader national discussions around interoperable electronic health records, including . He also led the first , engaging students across all 18 Canadian medical schools, and later first-authored one of the first national environmental scans of electronic health record interoperability in Canada, published in the . 

At UÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ, Sunand became a leading advocate for responsible artificial intelligence adoption and innovation in education. As founding advisor and co-chair of the Student Advisory Council for the , he helped secure $50,000 in student funding to expand AI education, student programming, hackathons and learning opportunities across faculties. Recognizing a similar gap in innovation exposure within medicine, he also founded the , creating one of the school’s largest student-led innovation communities focused on health-care entrepreneurship and interdisciplinary collaboration. His systems-focused work on surgical wait times later earned international recognition through a third-place finish at Oxford University’s , where his team became the first from UÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ to place on the global podium. 

That work ultimately led to the creation of CareQ, a digital health venture focused on improving surgical waitlist management, patient engagement and care co-ordination, earning him the Cannon Lachappelle Award for Entrepreneurial Thinking. Before entering medical school, Sunand founded , a national non-profit organization that has provided more than 2,000 students across seven Canadian cities with mentorship and hands-on research experience through a sustainable student-led model. He has also contributed to student leadership nationally as co-chair of the Section of Medical Students within the , helping relaunch and strengthen the organization’s national student governance structure. 

Before returning to medicine, Sunand spent two years at working with health-care and life sciences organizations across North America on technology and systems transformation initiatives, experience he later brought back into medicine through mentorship, innovation programming and applied health-care systems work at UÀóÖ¦ÊÓƵ. Throughout his academic career, he has authored more than 10 peer-reviewed , presented research at national and international conferences, and received more than $120,000 in scholarships and awards recognizing his leadership, scholarship and community impact. 

Across each of these initiatives, a common theme emerges: a commitment to building systems that strengthen institutions and create lasting opportunities for others. Whether advancing national health-care interoperability, expanding innovation ecosystems within medical education, or improving access to care through entrepreneurship, Sunand has consistently approached leadership as an opportunity to leave communities stronger and better connected for the future.