Magical Matura Ball in Toronto

Pavlo Terefenko

The Plaza Ballroom buzzed with excitement as nearly eight hundred people eagerly awaited the entrance of the 2003 Matura graduates. Mothers, fathers, grandparents and friends, all filled with pride, vied for prime spots to snap a photo. Ninety seven graduates emerged. The young ladies came out in beautiful flowing white gowns, and the guys, not to be outdone, donned their finest suits knowing that this was their big night. The graduates wore smiles spanning from ear to ear showing that they understood this night marked the culmination of years of hard work and sacrifice outside the daily rigors of high school. Their teachers understood too. With their help, the students struggled through a new curriculumand still found time to learn about their culture, history and language. 

Matura, held June 7, 2003 at the International Plaza Hotel in Toronto, is a ceremony and ball organised to honour students who complete requirements set by the Ukrainian Canadian School Board. This year’s Matura was attended by many dignitaries including Ihor Lossowsky, the Consul General of Ukraine, Yuri Kalischuk, the archbishop of Toronto and Eastern Canada’s Ukrainian Orthodox Church and Cornelius Pasichny, the bishop of Toronto and Eastern Canada’s Ukrainian Catholic Church. The evening also saw several speakers pass on messages to the graduates. First at the podium was Tania Onyschuk, the head of the Ukrainian Canadian School Board, Toronto Branch. Speaking in English and Ukrainian she underscored that the graduates were “key to the future” of Ukrainians in Canada. 

A highlight of the night was the presence of the Deputy Premier and Education Minister of Ontario, the Honourable Elizabeth Witmer. Not since Betty Stevenson attended Matura seventeen years ago has such a high-ranking official been in attendance at a Matura celebration. Herself an immigrant (the daughter of an Austrian father and Dutch mother), Ms Witmer stressed the importance of “extracurricular education” and its value in opening doors in the future. Besides being beneficial to oneself, Ms Witmer emphasized the benefit of multiculturalism to all of Canada. Ms Witmer also tried her hand at Ukrainian, opening her remarks with “Slava Isusu Khrystu” and closing with a resounding “Mnohaya Lita”. 

Other speakers included Laryssa Patten, a Robotics Instructor/Operations Engineer at the Canadian Space Agency where she trains astronauts and cosmonauts how to use and maintain the MSS, a robotic arm being used to assemble the International Space Station. Maxim Tarnawsky, a professor of Ukrainian Literature at the University of Toronto, concluded the speeches by pointing out that studies in Ukrainian do not necessarily end at Matura, and opportunities exist to pursue further study in a post-secondary school environment.

With the more formal segments of the evening concluded, the graduates were finally able to breathe a sigh of relief and celebrate in their own way. Local band Zahrava began to play and, dancing the night away, the graduates saw an important stage of their lives as Ukrainian-Canadians completed.

Pavlo Terefenko is a New Pathway summer intern. He and Andrika Hohol were masters of ceremonies at this year's Matura Ball