Pitt 2007 Student Government Board President Receives ODK Senior of the Year Award

PITTSBURGH-University of Pittsburgh 2007 Student Government Board (SGB) president Shady S. Henien, a senior majoring in neuroscience and political science, pre-med, with a minor in chemistry, received the 2008 Omicron Delta Kappa (ODK) Senior of the Year Award during Pitt's annual Honors Convocation Feb. 29 in Carnegie Music Hall, Oakland.

ODK, founded in 1914 at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Va., is an honorary society that recognizes students who maintain a high standard of leadership in collegiate activities. The award is given to students who possess and exhibit outstanding leadership qualities in service to the University.

Henien's academic achievements include a full-tuition scholarship to the University, Dean's List recognition, a Wilma Binder Zeder Memorial Scholarship, and Student National Medical Association Carolyn Carter Scholarship Award. He is a member of Sigma Alpha Lambda, a national leadership and honors organization. Henien was the 2005 Ambassador for the Summer Medical Enrichment Program at the University of Chicago Prizker School of Medicine, Rush Medical School, and Northwestern Medical School.

A member of SGB since 2006 and president in 2007, Henien was voted as the "Best Member of SGB" in The Pitt News 2007 "Best Of" edition. He also is a student member of the University Senate Council and the Pitt Board of Trustees Student Affairs Committee and an ex-officio member of the Pitt Alumni Association.

During the summer of 2007, Henien interned in U.S. Senator Arlen Specter's Washington, D.C., office. In 2006, he interned with trauma surgeons at AKh in Linz, Austria.

Among the student activities that Henien has been involved with are serving as offensive guard in 2005 on Pitt's varsity football team, a position he earned as a walk-on. He was a member of Pi Sigma Alpha Political Science Honors Fraternity in 2005 and 2006 and Pitt's debate team in 2004. Since 2005, he has been a member of the Neuroscience Club and the National Society of Collegiate Scholars.

Henien has participated in various community service projects, including Delta Chi Fraternity's Project Clean-up Oakland, clothing drives for the Salvation Army, Valentine's Day Cards for Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC, and fundraising for the fraternity's national philanthropy organization, The V Foundation for Cancer Research.

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