A new scholarship from FP Canada, the FP Canada Diversity in Action Scholarship, is part of the organization’s larger efforts to diversify Canada’s planner population.
In an interview with the Insurance Portal, Tashia Batstone, FP Canada president and CEO, notes that the organization has signed onto the federal government’s 50-30 Challenge Canada, which encourages organizations to increase their diversity by setting a goal of achieving gender parity (50 per cent representation from women and men alike), and 30 per cent representation of other underrepresented groups.
Although the campaign encourages organizations to specifically look at diversity and reflect these numbers in their staffing, executive leadership and board member representation, Batstone says FP Canada has taken the effort further. “We’re looking at our whole certificate population,” she says. “We monitor against that. We have certain KPIs (key performance indicators) associated with increasing the diversity within the profession.”
First conceived of just over a year ago, the scholarship provides financial support – up to $5,000 in kind, each – toward the education of five students aspiring to complete either the certified financial planner (CFP) or qualified associate financial planner (QAFP) courses.
Winners are selected based on the strength of their personal essays wherein they outline different reasons for wanting to pursue financial planning certification, and on letters of reference provided by the applicants. Recipients receive enrollment in a qualifying education program of their choosing from the FP Canada Institute, at no-cost.
Batstone says although diversity numbers in the industry are trending in the right direction, progress is slow. The organization is determined to move those numbers, however, because without a diverse population of planners, “there is a risk that you get pockets of Canadians who do not feel comfortable, or do not feel that they have the ability to get the advice that they need to be more successful,” she says. “If you don’t appreciate the cultural challenges that someone is facing, their life, their history, their background, it could change the dynamic,” she adds. “We just want Canadians to have the option. I think that’s the key thing – being able to provide as much choice to Canadians as we can.”
Inaugural, 2025 winners of the FP Canada Diversity in Action Scholarship:
- Efe Rich Akhibi
- Manojkumar Ramachandran
- Joy Russell
- Jay Saspara
- Simon Nkotanyi
