2022 Award Recipients
This award was established in 2008 to recognize exceptional students who have a record of academic achievement, consistently demonstrate leadership, and make significant contributions to our community.
Shaelene Standing
Bachelor of Health Sciences (Honours)
Biomedical Sciences
In remarkable fashion, Shaelene Standing’s unique passions and experiences enriched the university community.
Through the UC Dance Company, an SU club she founded, Standing taught dance to hundreds of students, organized performances at DINOS athletic games and fundraised for causes.
Additionally, diagnosed with juvenile glaucoma in her left eye as a child, Standing reflected on her own impairments and used those experiences to become a role model for youth through dance. Her thoughtful accommodations as a volunteer dance teacher for the Alberta Sports and Recreation Association for the Blind and Kids Cancer Care made it possible for youth who may have medical barriers to learn dance.
Contributions to the dance community aside, Standing also represented students on the Bachelor of Health Sciences Student-Faculty Liaison Committee, the Future Alumni Network and the Medicine Alumni Advisory Council. She was a member of UCalgary’s Scholars Academy, where she took the opportunity to learn web design, a skill she used many times over — as a volunteer for the Kids Cancer Care Foundation of Alberta, in support of an online toolkit warning of the dangers of vaping, and on a website she designed to promote homemade masks that she made for vulnerable groups.
Standing has also been deeply involved in numerous research projects including a study about retinal cell renewal as part of an honour’s thesis. She has a passion for clinical-based research and volunteered with eight research projects throughout her degree.
Standing will attend medical school at UOttawa as part of their 2026 cohort and will also continue research on clinical treatment assessments for the paediatric population.