The alumni of the University of Canterbury will be launching their UC Alumni Samoa Chapter on 15 October in Samoa. 

Chairman of the alumni, Justice Vui Clarence Nelson said this will be the first-ever alumni for the University of Canterbury in Samoa and the Pacific. It is a historical moment for Samoa.

"There are a lot of University of Canterbury Alumni here in Samoa. Those who were educated there, did some work for the university, or associated with the University," said Justice Nelson. 

"Majority are in the engineering and science students because Canterbury is well known for its Engineering and Science School. There are a few lawyers like myself who graduated from the UC. We will be launching this on 15 October after the White Sunday holiday.

"We got together and decided that it's time we have an alumni chapter of all the members, ex-graduates of the University to try and get together to see if there is some form where we can give back to the university because university education usually comes at a time of a person's life when you are forming your life-long character. 

"It is usually between 18 to 25 years old. That time you are just coming out of your teenage years and going into adulthood. It's a time your character begins to be shaped."

He believes that they didn't just receive their degrees from the University, they returned to Samoa with more than just a degree. They are working towards ways to give back to the university.

"Now, we're at a stage where we're all successful one way or another. Some of us are successful business people, public servants, businesspeople, and others so there are probably some good constructive ways we can give back to the university through the things that we learnt from the university," he said.

"We're thinking of things not only for scholarships for underprivileged students for example. That is an expensive exercise but even partial scholarships to pay for their books. 

"In university is quite costly for textbooks. But there are other options such as mentoring programs we can do to help students who have been to the university before. We went through the experience so we know what's it like."

By using their experience, they will be able to give the students a picture of what to expect, what to look out for and so forth.

"The idea is, we want to form this alumni association with those aims in mind and possibly looking at ways we can promote it for our education here in Samoa. We have talked to the University and they said "Great, we will send a team over, and you can launch your alumni." 

The Vice Chancellor of the University of Canterbury along with two members from the University and two from the Alumni will be in Samoa next weekend for the launch.

"It's a high-level delegation from the University coming over to launch our alumni association. We've had two meetings of our alumni association, we are trying to reach out to everyone who attended the university to come to the launch and work together in this association."

They will also meet with their counterparts at both universities in Samoa, the Ministry of Education and the scholarship committee. They want to reach out to try and establish a relationship between the University alumni and the institutions in Samoa.