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Appeal for the CMU25 Student Impact Fund

Dear supporters and friends,

Maddie Hiebert, third-year science student at CMU

We are made in the image of a working God.

For six days, God laboured to create the world—to shape life with care, intention, and love. Through my studies at Canadian Mennonite University, I’ve come to believe that work is not just something we do to earn a living, it is central to our humanity. It is one of the ways we reflect God’s character in the world.

My name is Maddie Hiebert. I’m a third-year Bachelor of Science student at CMU. Like many students, I find myself asking hard questions about my future: What kind of work am I called to do? Where do my gifts meet the world’s deepest needs?

This past summer, searching for these answers led me to a small village in Kenya where I volunteered alongside physicians practicing under extraordinary pressure at the Kapsowar Mission Hospital. I assisted with basic medical care, shadowed doctors, and encountered patients enduring profound suffering. One day, while watching a physician care for a patient who had been left for dead, I asked her what quality mattered most to be a good doctor.

Maddie in Kenya, were she volunteered at a local hospital

Without hesitation, she said, “The ability to hold on to empathy—even when patients can’t be saved.”

That answer stayed with me. In Canada, our healthcare system often prizes speed and efficiency above presence. In Kenya, I saw medicine practiced with compassion, humility, and integrity.

Your generosity makes these transformative experiences possible—for students like me, and for the communities we are called to serve with.

When you support CMU, you are not simply funding a program or work placement. You are helping students like me test their calling and make their way in the world. You are forming graduates who understand that faith, work, and service belong together. You are equipping young people to lead with empathy and compassion in a world that desperately needs these things!

This experience in Kenya was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. It grew my perseverance, curiosity, humility, and compassion—qualities that cannot be taught in a classroom alone.

That is the power of experiential learning. And the promise of CMU.

Today, I invite you to make a gift to the CMU Annual Fund. Your donation—no matter the size—provides opportunities that help students graduate with experience, confidence, and clarity about their career path. Because of you, CMU graduates are prepared to find work and make it meaningful.

Thank you for investing in students and in the kind of opportunities students like me have, through CMU, to make God’s love visible in the world.

With gratitude,

Maddie Hiebert
Third-year student, Bachelor of Science
Canadian Mennonite University

P.S. Your gift to the CMU Annual Fund helps ensure that students don’t just graduate—they graduate ready. Thank you for being a part of that journey.

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