For the first time in its history, the University of Saskatchewan will offer a scholarship recognizing the contributions of LGBT students and allies that work towards LGBT activism.

The Brad Berg and Brian Rolfes LGBT Rights Scholarship, worth $25,000 over four years, will be given to a student in the College of Law who works for the advancement of LGBT rights through academic research or community involvement.

Brad Berg and his partner Brian Rolfes, both graduates of the U of S College of Law, created this scholarship to bring awareness to LGBT issues. Now living and working as lawyers in Toronto, the pair participates in various charitable activities.

“We’ve been involved with a number of charities over the years … so we’ve been in the ‘giving’ frame of mind for a while,” Berg said. However, the couple are looking to create something that will have a lasting impact.

Upon graduating from the U of S College of Law, Berg and Rolfes continued their educations at a number of different universities. Berg holds a masters of law from the University of Toronto, and Rolfes earned a masters in public administration from Carleton University as well as law degrees from both the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge.

They could have chosen to donate to any of these institutions but it is their special connection to the U of S that prompted them to invest here.

“It’s our home province,” Berg said. “We really loved our time there and we stay quite connected to the province because our families are still there, and we got married in Saskatoon at St. Andrew’s [Chapel] on the university campus in 1998, so once we looked at it that way it was easy for us to decide.”

When Berg and Rolfes were in university, a scholarship of this kind would have been unimaginable.

“When we were coming through university in the 80s, there weren’t a lot of role models around us. There were a couple of people in Saskatchewan that were known to be gay or lesbian. Some of them were quite out; some were more closeted, but more often than not when you would hear about sexual orientation, or gay or lesbian issues, it was often in a negative light or some controversy around it,” Berg said.

Beth Bilson, interim dean of the College of Law, gave a positive response to the donation of the scholarship.

“We were delighted. We have — both Brad and Brian — we’ve been watching their careers with interest. They’ve both done very interesting things. They’ve been very successful, and they were very memorable students,” Bilson said. “It’s wonderful that they would make this gesture for the college and I think we were really pleased that they feel connected to the college.”

While a lot has changed over the last few decades, Bilson acknowledges that there is still progress to be made.

“I think we haven’t thought particularly hard about LGBT students and the kind of exclusion they may be feeling, and I think that it’s important for anybody to be able to recognize themselves in the institution and to feel that they have a value to the institution,” Bilson said.

Berg also recognizes the importance of role models and public activism. He encourages LGBT students to consider openness.

“If there’s one thing I would say, its if you are comfortable enough and ready to do it, you should be out. Even now with all the changes in the law and popular culture and everything else, there still is, in many places, a stigma to being gay,” Berg said. “The more that people can come out and be visible and be themselves, be authentic, I think the happier they’ll be, but the more it will benefit those around them.”

Despite his time away from Saskatchewan, Berg hasn’t forgotten his prairie roots.

“Go Riders!” Berg said. “We’re still very much Saskatchewan boys living in Toronto, and so I would just say we are very proud to be from Saskatchewan.”