LIFESTORIES: Vaughan teacher left a lasting legacy of caring

Yorkregion.com
April 9, 2015
By Adam Martin-Robbins

Tanya Khan dedicated her life to promoting human rights, religious tolerance and social justice.

Although she died in 2013 of complications from a brain aneurysm, the 38-year-old mother of three’s legacy lives on.

“She’s the kind of person that changes your life forever because she doesn’t accept the status quo,” said Angie Furlin, principal at Louis-Honore Frechette Public School, where Khan taught. "If it doesn’t work, (she would say,) ‘How are we going to fix it’?”

Khan was born in Edmonton, Alberta in 1975, the year after her parents emigrated from Lebanon.

When she was still young, her family moved to the GTA and opened a restaurant.

The eldest of five girls, Khan was raised as a Druze, but in the months before starting Ryerson University she began her conversion to Islam.

“That summer she read the Bible and the Qur’an in its entirety. She decided at that moment she was going to be Muslim,” her husband Asif Khan explained.

He met Tanya during her first day on campus and fell for her right away.

“She was absolutely stunning. But getting to know her, you just realize she was the real thing. She was the total package,” Asif said. “She was an amazing wife in the sense that she did everything: ran the house, looked after the kids. She even cut the grass.”

Tanya also had an incredible sense of humour.

“Whenever we were at a guest’s house or a function, I could always hear her because she was the loudest one, always making people laugh,” Asif said. “People were attracted to her quickly.”

That ability stood her in good stead when, after a stint in the private sector, Tanya decided to change career paths and become a teacher.

Her first full-time teaching job was at Kleinburg Public School, where then-principal Furlin offered her a job teaching kindergarten.

“There was some push back about bringing a hijab-wearing Muslim to the community,” Asif recalled. “Angie (Furlin) knew Tanya and said, ‘Don’t worry, you guys will grow to love her’. She became a favourite, not just of the parents, but also of the kids and the teachers. She just had this ability to motivate, and then nobody saw her wearing a hijab anymore.”

Khan introduced numerous transformational initiatives at both schools during her 11 years as a teacher - from social justice initiatives supporting Me to We to monthly assemblies focused on socio-economic, gender and religious equity.

“To bring those kinds of messages to a school community and more traditional communities, it’s hard,” Furlin said.

“To know how many people in the Jewish community and the Russian community learned about the Muslim community is incredible. It was all about learning, all about sharing and breaking down the barriers.”

Khan’s passion and sunny outlook struck a chord with many students.

“She always pushed me and all the students to go further, always strive to be the best and don’t settle for anything less,” former student Hallie Rodney said. “The first day of Grade 7, I was really nervous and we were all waiting in the classroom and she came in and she was singing and so happy. You could tell that she had such positive vibes.”

Rodney recalls Khan challenging her students to confront their own beliefs about people from different faiths and cultures.

“I think she was the most amazing teacher I have ever had and probably will ever have,” said Rodney, the first recipient of Frechette’s Tanya Khan Award.

“To me, she made everything so intriguing and she always had a sense of humour.”

Rodney was especially moved by one of the quotes Khan often shared with her colleagues and students.

She used it to open her Grade 8 valedictory address:

“Be careful of your thoughts for they become your words. Be careful of your words for they become your actions. Be careful of your actions for they become your habits. Be careful of your habits for they become your character. Be careful of your character for it becomes your destiny.”

Another quote Khan was fond of is now emblazoned above the entrance to what is now the Tanya Khan room at Frechette.

It says: “Human rights is not a buffet where we can choose some things and not others. If we believe in human rights, we believe in it for all people.”

“The room is now our positive-space area where we have our meetings for students who are struggling,” Furlin said.

Khan’s impact at Frechette was so profound that today when teachers there face challenging situations they often ask: “What would Tanya do? How would she help us?” Furlin said.

Khan was also active at the Ahmadiyya Baitul Islam Mosque in Maple and throughout the community.

Among myriad other things, she helped organize a build for Habitat for Humanity involving women from different faith groups.

That resulted in the creation of a women’s interfaith group that still meets. She also served as a role model to young girls in Vaughan’s large Muslim community.

“Unfortunately, Muslim women get that stigma attached to them or the perception that they need to always be in the background,” Asif said. “She was one of the women who showed that you can be more.”

To honour his wife’s legacy and inspire others, he created the Tanya Khan Academic and Leadership Scholarship Award, presented annually to a Muslim woman who is university bound.