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Policy Major and Campus Leader Shandiin Herrera Named Undergraduate Student of the Year by American Indian Center

Herrera is a senior public policy major from Utah

Shandiin Herrera
A member of the Navajo Nation, Shandiin Herrera has promoted the Native American community at Duke as well as win plaudits for her public policy work.

The American Indian Graduate Center has chosen Duke senior Shandiin Herrera as its 2018 Undergraduate Student of the Year.  

American Indian Graduate Center & AIGCS are the largest scholarship providers to Native students in the United States, awarding more than $15 million in scholarships annually.

Herrera, a senior public policy major from Monument Valley, Utah, is a member of the Navajo Nation.  She is a Udall Scholar, a Gates Millennium Scholar, and a Chief Manuelito Scholar. 

Herrera is president of the new Duke chapter of the first Native American sorority, Alpha Pi Omega Sorority. She has served as both the treasurer and powwow chair for the Native American Student Alliance.

Herrera has also been recognized as a Champion for Change by the Center for Native American Youth at the Aspen Institute, and she has recently been named a winner of the Forever Duke Student Leadership Award.

Next year, Herrera will serve as a policy analyst and project consultant for the Navajo Nation Oljato Chapter as a participant in the Lead for America Hometown Fellowship.