Honours Bachelor of Environmental Studies in Environment and Business (Co-Op) • University of Waterloo
Bio
Rumaisha graduated from the University of Waterloo in 2024 with an Honours Bachelor of Environmental Studies. From a young age, Rumaisha realized that she had a passion for environmental advocacy, which resulted in her joining various student clubs in high school, ranging from the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) club and Fair Trade club to representing her high school at the Markham Environmental Advisory Committee where she worked along with municipal leaders and community members to raise awareness of environmental issues in the City of Markham.
During her time in her undergraduate program, Rumaisha’s passion for the SDGs led her to the role of Vice President of Impact Alliance, the SDGs student hub part of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) Youth network at the University of Waterloo. One of her main highlights as Vice President was co-organizing and facilitating Impact Challenge, Canada’s first Sustainability Hackathon. At Impact Challenge, groups were given 24 hours to identify solutions to case studies that related to sustainability and current world issues. Another one of her highlights was organizing and leading the Women’s Entrepreneurship panel in March 2023, where a panel session of four women shared their stories and gave audience members their advice on juggling entrepreneurship, being students, motherhood and working full-time jobs.
To explore how to integrate her degree into real-world problems, Rumaisha’s fourth-year capstone project was identifying ways to alleviate food insecurity in Toronto. Her group, HydroBud, had researched the feasibility of implementing hydroponic units in food banks to help combat food insecurity in Toronto. HydroBud had decided to explore the implementation of hydroponics by conducting interviews with food bank staff and ultimately finding a positive answer. The group went on to pitch their innovative idea and received awards from the Faculty of Environment and GreenHouse, the social impact incubator, at the University of Waterloo.
During her final co-op semester, Rumaisha realized she was interested in pursuing a master’s program to further her learning in integrating sustainability into the workplace. Her previous co-op was as a Sustainability Intern at an auto parts manufacturing company. This position allowed her to gain valuable experience in reporting sustainability metrics on different platforms such as CDP and M2030, developing and delivering sustainability training for employees, calculating greenhouse gas emissions, and facilitating the process of developing Science Based Targets for the company.
During her spare time, Rumaisha enjoys going on walks with her dog, hiking with her friends and family, venturing to different restaurants, and reading. Lately, she has been connecting to her South Asian roots by learning to cook cultural dishes and is enjoying watching documentaries on various topics.