Manhasset native Melody Tomlinson was one of two SUNY College at Old Westbury students to receive the Chancellor’s Award for Student Excellence, the state school system’s highest community service honor.
Both perennial Dean’s List students and recent Old Westbury graduates, Tomlinson and Valley Stream native Yuvraj Singh were among the 256 students selected to receive the honor from schools throughout the SUNY system.
“Students receiving this award are to be commended for their excellence as role models, artists, scholar athletes and civic volunteers,” SUNY Chancellor Nancy L. Zimpher said in a statement. “Their leadership can serve as an inspiration to all SUNY students and a tremendous point of pride for the entire SUNY family.”
The Chancellor’s Award for Student Excellence recognizes students who have “best demonstrated…the integration of academic excellence with accomplishments in the areas of leadership, athletics, community service, creative and performing arts or career achievement,” according to a news release from SUNY Old Westbury.
Tomlinson, who had a 3.9 grade point average as an English major, was a writing consultant at the school’s Writing Center and served as vice president of Old Westbury’s chapter of the international English honor society Sigma Tau Delta.
Her work was also published in both Harmonia: the Creative Writing Journal of SUNY Old Westbury and Discordia: The Scholarly Journal of SUNY Old Westbury.
She was also a student organizer for Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Vijay Sheshadri’s speaking engagement at Old Westbury last November and helped publicize and film the event with a television crew.
In his time at Old Westbury, Singh was vice president and public relations officer for the school’s Science Club, was a mentor in the Honors College Program and co-founded the school’s chapter of Volunteers Around the World.
A researcher of markings for prostate cancer, Singh also traveled with 16 other students to the Dominican Republic to assist a medical clinic that helped treat 700 patients in six days.