At its National Convention in December, the national service fraternity Alpha Phi Omega (APO) awarded two awards to Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s (RPI) Epsilon Zeta chapter.

Epsilon Zeta was awarded the Dean Arno Nowotny Service Award for the sixth time — a record for all the APO chapters. The Dean Arno Nowotny Service Award is given to the APO chapter with the “best overall, most well-balanced service program.” RPI also received this award in 1980, 1984, 1998, 2004, and 2010.

“Given that APO is a service fraternity, we are super proud to have shown that our chapter at RPI has the strongest service program,” said Rafael Cenzano ’25, computer science major and Epsilon Zeta chapter president. “This is a testament to the hard work of our chapter and the strong service environment on the RPI campus.” 

The Epsilon Zeta chapter also received the Josiah Frank Historian Award for the second time for maintaining the best chapter history. “This is in large part thanks to the efforts of the Institute Archives and Special Collections on campus,” said Cenzano. The first time the chapter received the award was in 2004. 

In total, Epsilon Zeta has received nine national awards from APO, a record among all chapters. Epsilon Zeta has been leading community service efforts and serving the RPI campus for more than 75 years.