Jennifer Kelleher Wins Miami University's President's Distinguished Service Award

2017 Apr 26

Miami University student Jennifer Kelleher is one of 23 seniors to win this year's President's Distinguished Service Award.

The awards are presented each year to graduating seniors for their contributions to campus, the greater community and to higher education.

Jennifer Kelleher has focused on making an impact on the wellness of current students and on expanding research about wellness. She has been a HAWK Peer Health Educator for three and a half years, presenting on a wide variety of college health topics to student groups. Jennifer’s strong planning and implementation skills, as well as her creativity, were quickly recognized and she was promoted to the Office Manager position within the organization, where she is partly responsible for managing staff and processes. She was also tapped to be the lead developer of Flourish Miami, which focuses on everyone’s ability to positively impact their own mental health. She set the groundwork for the program which one nominator believes will be an instrumental part of our mental health initiatives. In her research, Jennifer has explored various aspects of drunk-o-rexia, which is the intentional avoidance of eating to save calories for planned alcohol consumption. She researched differences by gender and the impact of fitness trackers on prevalence of this phenomenon.

The winners are also awarded the Senior Service Leadership Award and wear a special medallion at commencement.

Kelleher, from Dayton, is earning a Bachelor of Science in Business majoring in Marketing.

Miami University was 1 of only 5 universities in the nation to receive the Presidential Award in the 2012 President's Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll. In 2013, Miami received an honor roll placement with distinction. Miami has been named to The President's Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll every year since 2007.