UBC Reports | Vol. 50 | No. 5 | May 6, 2004

Nobel Laureates Receive Honorary Degrees from UBC

Canada’s national newspaper called it “a one-of-a-kind traveling road show, and we may never see its likes again.”

The Globe and Mail reporter was referring to the historic visit to UBC’s campus of three Nobel Peace Laureates. His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the exiled leader of Tibet and the winner of the 1989 peace prize, South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu who won the prize in 1984 and last year’s winner Iranian human rights activist Shirin Ebadi all gathered at the Chan Centre for the Performing Arts. They joined other spiritual leaders in a three-hour roundtable discussion of the importance of balancing educating the mind with educating the heart. They also received honorary degrees from UBC.

The world visionaries came to Vancouver at the invitation of Pitman Potter, the director of the Institute of Asian Research, and his colleague Victor Chan a close associate of the Dalai Lama. The event also marked the official beginning of a new program being offered by the institute called Contemporary Tibetan Studies.

Thousands of British Columbians were able to see the Dalai Lama, many in person at the various events where he spoke and many more on television and web broadcasts.