Maxime Desharnais

Maxime Desharnais is in his final year as an undergraduate student in Concordia’s Civil Engineering program. An outstanding student leader, Desharnais strongly believes in community involvement and in empowering the youth to lead projects to improve society.

He has been the president of the Engineers Without Borders (EWB) Concordia chapter since 2016, but he has been heavily involved with the organization since 2014. As a junior fellow with EWB, he spent four month in Ghana, volunteering on a project to improve agricultural techniques. Desharnais also successfully advocated to have Concordia added to the list of Fairtrade campuses.

In March 2017, he helped host the largest Sustainable Development Goals youth training in Canada, aiming to inspire sustainable changes. He also started a partnership between a foodbank and grocery store to help feed those in need.

For his contributions, Desharnais has received the Loyola Alumni Prize in Engineering in Society, the Order of Merit in the humanitarian category from the City of Brossard, the Brian T. Counihan Scholarship for Outstanding Contribution to Student Life and a Concordia Volunteer Award in 2018.