The third annual Student Leadership and Involvement awards were held Monday, April 29 in Kryzsko’s East Room.

Winona State University students, club advisers and clubs were recognized for their execution of Winona State’s ideals.

The awards steam from 10 different categories that recognize the different levels of impactful things clubs and organizations have going on at Winona State.

Senior Jiayue Gu was the recipient of the “A Leader Improving Our World” award, which recognizes someone who displayed excellent leadership abilities.

“I’m so excited,” Gu said. “I’m so thankful for the people who nominated me. I am just very appreciative.”

The “Warrior Spirit” award, which recognized a leader willing to take risks, was awarded to senior, Logan Wescott.

“This means to me that I was awarded and recognized for the hard work that I was able to put into the school and the Commission for Active and Freedom of Speech,” Wescott said.

Wescott said he was personally flattered by those who nominated him for the award.

“It means a lot to be recognized by those who I did not know were watching me,” Wescott said.

The “Rising Star” award, which recognizes a first-year Winona State student who has been actively involved in a campus activity, was presented to Adia Fuller.

For the club and organization awards, Zach Boudreau was recognized for his work with the Winona State Hockey Club with the “Outstanding Club/Organization Advisor” award and The Hmong American Student Association received the award for “Outstanding Club/Organization” award.

Event-wise, Bridges Health Winona was credited the “Community Engagement Program/Event” award, while the “Ala Mode Tournaments” at Nate & Ally’s hosted by Winona Super Smash Brothers Club received the Social Program/Event award. The Los Infantilis Project won the Educational Program/Event award.

The University Theme Program/Event award, which recognized a series that supported Winona State’s theme of resilience, was the final award announced. It was presented to junior Taylor Juresh and senior Kari Schneiss for their work with the Green Bandana Project.   

With it being the third year that Winona State has hosted this event, the Associate Director of Student Activities & Leadership, Tracy Rahim, said the campus was impressed with the number of nominations the students had to offer for the variety of awards this year.

“We have over 110 different honorees, which is significantly higher than we had in the past two years, which is exciting,” Rahim said. “We added four different award program and event category, that certainly increased our nominations as well. We’re really excited to be able to honor a lot of different students this year.”

As far as how winners were chosen, Rahim spoke on the process.

“We have a committee that is made up of folks from Student Senate, Alliance from Student Organizations, the Warriors Lead Series and Student Activities,” Rahim said. “We sit down and go through all the nominations and then make a collective decision on the award winners.”