1. Ratna Omidvar retired from the Senate on November 5,2024 upon reaching the mandatory retirement age of 75.
16 Facts About Ratna Omidvar
1. 2.
Ratna Omidvar met her Iranian husband while studying in Germany and went to live with him in Iran in 1975.
3.
Ratna Omidvar became executive director of the Maytree Foundation, a charitable organization to combat poverty in Canada, before departing in 2014 to found the Global Diversity Exchange at the Ted Rogers School of Management, Toronto Metropolitan University where she was a distinguished visiting professor.
4.
Ratna Omidvar is a director at the Environics Institute, and Samara Canada.
5.
Ratna Omidvar is the Toronto Region Immigrant Employment Council's chair emerita and was formerly the chair of Lifeline Syria.
6.
Ratna Omidvar is co-author of Flight and Freedom: Stories of Escape to Canada, an Open Book Toronto best book of 2015 and one of the Toronto Star's top five good reads from Word on the Street.
7.
Ratna Omidvar is a contributor to The Harper Factor and co-editor of Five Good Ideas: Practical Strategies for Non-Profit Success.
8.
Ratna Omidvar was named to the Senate of Canada by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to represent Ontario on March 18,2016, joining the Independent Senators Group.
9.
In October 2018, Ratna Omidvar introduced a motion to strip Aung San Suu Kyi of her honorary Canadian citizenship over her government's actions in the Rohingya conflict.
10.
Ratna Omidvar expressed her objections to Bill S-219 "An Act to deter Iran-sponsored terrorism, incitement to hatred, and human rights violations", and voted negatively on the bill which was eventually declined by the Senate of Canada in May 2018.
11.
Ratna Omidvar notably interacted with Laird Hunter on October 22,2018, in a Senate Committee dealing with charities and non-profits.
12.
Ratna Omidvar was appointed to the Order of Ontario in 2005 and became a Member of the Order of Canada in 2011, with both honours recognizing her advocacy work on behalf of immigrants and devotion to reducing inequality in Canada.
13.
Ratna Omidvar received an honorary doctorate in laws York University in 2012.
14.
In 2014, Ratna Omidvar received the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany in recognition of her contribution to the advancement of German-Canadian relations.
15.
Ratna Omidvar has been recognized by Canada's national newspaper, The Globe and Mail, by being named as its Nation Builder of the Decade for Citizenship in 2010.
16.
In 2018, Ratna Omidvar was one of the recipients of the 2018 Top 25 Canadian Immigrant Awards presented by Canadian Immigrant Magazine.