It wasn’t the graduating year Udhay Mangat had expected – but, all things considered, the New Westminster Secondary School student is feeling pretty fortunate.
Even though the COVID-19 pandemic threw a wrench into the final few months of his secondary school career, he’s still looking back on the first half of 2020 as a success.
“I think, in a sense, I got lucky,” he says. “Sports is a huge part of my life, and I got to play basketball. … The highlight of my high school life was basketball, and I got to finish it on a good note. I got to finish my season.”
He even had a chance to enjoy a grad ceremony with six of his closest friends, thanks to the school’s decision to host reworked, socially distanced ceremonies at Anvil Centre earlier this month – and he rates that experience as “pretty cool.”
The 17-year-old Grade 12 student is also winding up his high school days on another high note: he was just announced as one of the winners of a Beedie Luminaries scholarship.
The program, which was launched by Burnaby developer/philanthropist Ryan Beedie in 2018, honours B.C. students who have demonstrated “resilience, grit, academic readiness and the determination needed to succeed.” It combines financial assistance (to the tune of $40,000 for a four-year undergraduate degree) with mentorship, student support and paid summer internship opportunities, with a goal to remove barriers for students who are facing financial adversity.
Udhay says the opportunity will be "life-changing."
“They want you to be successful,” he says. “They give you guidance, and they help you want to achieve more. … It pushes you.”
Udhay was born in Burnaby but has lived in Queensborough – “where I know almost everyone,” he says – his whole life, with his close-knit extended family nearby. His mom, Preet, and his dad, Devpreet, have been constant supports in his life, he says; his mom stayed home to raise him, and his dad worked hard to provide for the family.
Ever since early childhood, Udhay has been active in sports. He got his start in soccer, followed by football and swimming.
Udhay suffered his first major injury when he tore his ACL (the anterior cruciate ligament that stabilizes the knee) when he was only in Grade 1. He finally had to have surgery for it in Grade 4. (That particular injury wasn’t sports-related: “It was kind of me doing something silly, and then it ended up being something worse than it should,” he confesses.)
That was the first time the young athlete realized how tough it was to go without sports. Fortunately, with his family’s support, he recovered both physically and mentally and was able to return to his athletic life. He took up basketball in Grade 7 and started getting serious about it in Grade 9.
“Sports has been my life my whole life,” he says. “That helped make me who I am today. Through sports, I deal with my emotions and kind of work on my mental health.”
It was another knee injury, this time a torn meniscus leading to surgery in his Grade 10 year, that led to both a bout of depression and to a new realization about the importance of school in Udhay’s life.
“My knee surgery in Grade 10 kind of forced me to put my effort from basketball more to my education. It helped me realize that sports can be taken away from you right away, so you have to have an education,” he says. “It showed me what I need to be happy and what my purpose is in life, and what I need to keep my mental health stable.”
Udhay credits his Grade 10 socials teacher, Mr. Assim, for really inspiring him to want to pursue a university education.
The teen athlete says he’ll always love sports, and he’ll definitely continue to try to play basketball at the post-secondary level. But he’s also realized that, along with education, he needs a more rounded approach to his mental health, and he relies on music, meditation and yoga to ground him.
His own experience with sports-related injuries led him to his chosen studies in kinesiology. Udhay’s own physiotherapist, Mike Foster, has become a mentor to him and is someone Udhay credits for setting him on his current path.
“I want to be able to help other athletes recover and get back to the sports they love,” he says.
So far, it looks like Udhay’s first term of post-secondary education will take place largely online, with a few of the smaller classes taking place in person. He’s prepared for whatever the year throws at him, noting he has the experience of online learning under his belt already. His verdict? “It’s not bad. It’s definitely different from regular school; you have to learn more yourself.”
Since the pandemic started, Udhay has also been using his time to pursue another project – he’s launched his own clothing brand, called Prolific Positivity. Ten percent of profits will be donated for mental health awareness, in an effort to erase the stigma that comes along with mental illness.
“It was just a thought that popped into my head one night when I couldn’t sleep, and I decided to pursue it,” he explains.
The next day, he called one of his aunts, who’s in business, and discussed how he might go about launching his own brand. So he created a website (watch for it to launch at www.prolificpositivity.com) and found a drop shipping company that prints on demand for him.
So far, he’s sold 20 shirts – you can check out some of his offerings on Instagram @prolificpositivity.
As he eyes his future at Simon Fraser University and beyond, Udhay wants to share advice with the younger students coming up behind him.
“Put your effort in,” he says. “I think a lot of people take high school lightly. I think education is something you should not take lightly; you should always put 110% effort into it.”
See www.beedieluminaries.ca for more on the Beedie Luminaries program.
