Garrett Curtis, Photography Editor

Eleven members of the class of 2025 were recognized on Sunday for their accomplishments in athletics, commitment to academic scholarship and contributions to the Yale community.

The students received awards during the Class Day ceremony, where graduates wore distinctive hats and their families sat behind them on Old Campus. Each winner who was in attendance walked to the stage to hear a commendation from an administrator.

Here is a rundown of the undergraduate award recipients.

Athletics awards

Director of Athletics Vicky Chun presented two athletic awards — the Nellie Pratt Elliot Award and the William Neely Mallory Award — to the senior woman and senior man, respectively, who demonstrated the “highest ideals of American sportsmanship and Yale tradition” through athletic excellence and life as a student, according to the award descriptions.

Mia Levy ’25, the outgoing captain of the women’s crew team, received the Nellie Pratt Elliot Award. Levy is a two-time world champion, from junior and under-23 competitions, and Chun said the rowing coach had called Levy a “once-in-a-generation talent.” Alongside athletic accomplishments, Levy was the co-president of the Yale chapter of Athlete Ally, a national network dedicated to fostering inclusive environments for LGBTQ+ student athletes, and a peer tutor at the Pourvu Center for Teaching and Learning.

Levy, who was competing in the Ivy League rowing championship in New Jersey, watched the Class Day livestream, Chun said.

Chun next presented the William Neely Mallory Award to Bez Mbeng ’25, the point guard for the men’s basketball team who also received the title of Ivy League Defensive Player of the Year three times. Chun said that Mbeng is an all-time leader in the program for steals. Beyond his athletic accomplishments, Mbeng also has over 100 hours of community service in New Haven schools, Chun said.

Community-wide awards

Following a comedic performance by two seniors, Catherine Panter-Brick, the head of Morse College and chair of the Council of Heads of Colleges, announced the Nakanishi Prize and the James Andrew Haas Prizes recipients.

Ethan Estrada ’25 and Kennedy Odiboh ’25 won the Nakanishi Prize for “exemplary leadership in enhancing race and/or ethnic relations” and maintained high academic standards during their time as an undergraduate. 

Estrada is a peer liaison at the Latin American Cultural Center, or La Casa, and the historian of Mecha de Yale — a student social justice group focused on issues that impact the Latino population. Estrada was also a co-moderator of De Colores, Yale’s queer and Latine affinity group, and editor-in-chief of Broad Recognition, an online undergraduate feminist magazine. Next year, they will pursue a doctoral program in English and creative writing at the University of Southern California.

“Since their first year at Yale, they have been a vital presence at La Casa Cultural,” Panter-Brick said.

Odiboh is a first-year liaison and head student assistant at the Afro-American Cultural Center, which on Saturday awarded him its Outstanding Student Leader Award. He has also participated in student organizations such as the Yale Black Men’s Union and Yale Model African Union.

Odiboh also volunteers at the Downtown Evening Soup Kitchen and the Yale Prison Education Initiative, Panter-Brick said. He is set to enter a master’s program at the Yale School of Public Health.

“Kennedy is a mentor and guide for other students at Yale,” Panter-Brick said.

Nyché Andrew ’25 won the James Andrew Haas Prize, an award conferred to the senior whom faculty have determined is a leader among fellow students, inspiring a “love of learning and concern for others” through their intellectual achievements, character and “fundamental humanity.”

Panter-Brick said that Andrew “played a pivotal role” in advocating for a new certificate in Native American and Indigenous Studies, which was recently approved.

“Her work is not only intellectually rigorous but deeply rooted in care,” Panter-Brick said.

Awards for fields of study

Yale College Dean Perciles Lewis announced the recipients of three academic prizes, each awarded to the student who “ranks highest in scholarship” in a particular academic area.

Oliver Huston ’25, a classics major graduating with a masters degree and an advanced certificate in Russian, received the prize in humanities. Teddy Tawil ’25, an Ethics, Politics and Economics major, won the social sciences award. Andy Nilipour ’25, an astrophysics and mathematics major, with a certificate in Japanese, received the natural sciences and mathematics award.

Lewis noted that Huston, Tawil and Nilpour each received A’s in all of their classes. The three seniors are graduating with 41, 39 and 44 credits, respectively, each exceeding the graduation requirement of 36 credits.

Lewis also presented Nicole Lam ’25 and Mazie Wong ’25 with this year’s Louis Sudler Prize for excellence in the arts.

Lam earned a bachelor’s degree in applied mathematics and a joint bachelor’s and master’s degree in computer science. She served as an assistant conductor for the Yale Student Orchestra, founded the nonprofit Love Through Music and conducted for numerous productions during her undergraduate years.

Wong holds a degree in art, completing a fresco mural installed in Jonathan Edwards College while an undergraduate.

“More than an artist and muralist, Mazie is a world builder,” Lewis said.

Ethan Levinbook ’25 received the Alpheus Henry Snow Prize, which is awarded to the senior who has been determined by the faculty to have “done the most for Yale by inspiring classmates with an admiration for scholarship,” per the prize’s description.

Levinbook will graduate with a joint bachelor’s and master’s degree in French — the first student to complete that program, Lewis said.

Class Day occurs one day before Commencement.

Ariela Lopez contributed reporting.