JULIA TIERNAN/YH Juliana Schantz-Dunn, CC '00, is the only female nominee for the Humanitarian Award for service this year.

Women's hockey captain up for national honor

When Yale students surf sports websites on the Internet, usually the only interesting information they find is whether their favorite hometown team won. The last thing Yale women's hockey player Sara Wood, SM '01, expected to find when she visited USCollegeHockey.com a few weeks ago was that her team's two-time captain, Julianna Schantz-Dunn, CC '00, was one of 15 nominees for one of the top awards in college hockey, the Humanitarian Award.

Schantz-Dunn was just as surprised when Wood informed her of the news. "The coaches didn't tell me they'd nominated me," Schantz-Dunn said. "[Coach John Marchetti] just told me a few months ago that the ECAC was profiling all of the women's ice hockey captains and that he needed some information." Her surprise reached new heights when the Sports Publicity Office informed her last week that she was named one of five finalists for the award, which is given annually to a college hockey player who has exhibited a strong commitment to community, team, and studies.

Though Schantz-Dunn is the first Eli to make it into the final round in the five-year history of the Humanitarian Award, she is quick to play down her accomplishment. "[Being named a finalist] hit me by surprise because I don't feel like I've really done that much standout stuff," she said.

It's easy to side with Marchetti. Since her freshman year, Schantz-Dunn has been an extremely active volunteer in the New Haven community. During both her freshman and sophomore years she served as the team's representative to the Community Outreach Committee (COC), which provides community service opportunities to athletes. As a committee member, she organized hockey clinics and team trips to local hospitals, participated in Youth Days, and mentored an eighth grade New Haven public school student on a weekly basis. "It's really a new experience to see 200 kids come out to the field [for clinics]," she said. "People leave with a sense that Yale is doing something good for the community and that a relationship can be built between Yale athletes and kids."

The four-letter captain's strong interest in community service has also taken her far outside the reaches of New Haven. Schantz-Dunn spent the summer after her freshman year working in a children's welfare agency in Oak Park, Ill. through the Association of Yale Alumni Community Service Summer Fellowship. She was involved in the agency's family reunification and adoption programs, helping to supervise parent-child visits. Schantz-Dunn's most eye-opening experience involved a young girl she tutored who was in the middle of the adoption process. "One day I was driving the girl home and she suddenly asked me, `What does adoption mean?'" she recalled. "And suddenly I realized that in the eyes of a seven year old, it's forever—she's getting a new mommy and daddy. It was a really hard thing."

Schantz-Dunn encountered more strife while working in Peru this past summer in the public health department of a non-government organization that provides small credit loans to aid the development of impoverished regions. Working on a malaria survey in a small village near the capital city of Lima and volunteering for medical missions fueled her long-time interest in international medicine. "I've always wanted to become a doctor in the international arena," she said. "There are a lot of aspects of health care that involve cultural and ethnic differences, and I think it's important to understand them." Schantz-Dunn hopes to win a Fulbright grant so that she can return to Peru and survey a parasite that causes epilepsy, and eventually attend medical school.

Although it is hard to understand how she is able to handle her responsibilities as a dedicated captain, community volunteer, and a strong student, Schantz-Dunn can't see how she could have done it any other way. "I think if I weren't involved in certain things at Yale, I wouldn't be happy as a person," she explained. "It's been a crunch at times, but it has also been worth it. What I've learned in the locker room, on the ice, and in the community has been of equal value with what I've learned in my classes."

The winner of the Humanitarian Award will be announced on Fri., Apr. 7, in Providence, R.I., as part of the festivities surrounding the NCAA Frozen Four. Whether or not Schantz-Dunn receives the award, though, Marchetti still thinks she is an all-around winner. "There are many people who can play the game of hockey, but it's something special when an athlete like Julianna can find the time to reach out to the community or go to a foreign country and offer her services," Marchetti said. "Much like her captaincy, just as she thinks of her players first, she always thinks of other people first."

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