QUEENSBURY, N.Y. (NEWS10) – Two SUNY Adirondack students have been named as 2023’s State University of New York Chancellor’s Award for Student Excellence winners. What makes them unique: They’re twins, and the first siblings to ever win the award together.

Lucy and Kate McKay were announced this week as the recipients of this year’s SUNY award. The pair of identical twins hail from Cambridge in Washington County, and were homeschooled preceding college. They’ve learned together all their lives, and haven’t stopped now – both attending SUNY Adirondack as liberal arts majors, focusing in math and sciences, with a mutual interest in ecology driven by a lifetime of camping and hiking.

“I’ve been interested in nature as long as I can remember,” said Lucy McKay in an interview with SUNY Adirondack. “So I knew I wanted to study ecology and the environment.”

The sisters earned a perfect 4.0 GPA across their four semesters at SUNY Adirondack, landing them spots on the President’s List. Both sisters have earned TRIO Academic Excellence Awards for their work with TRIO Student Support Services, a federal student support program. They both serve as chemistry tutors, and can be found in the Phi Theta Kappa Internation Honor Society.

For both, an interest in ecology has been a mainstay throughout their academic careers. Both students volunteer at the Vermont Center for Ecostudies, Albany Pine Bush Preserve and other environmental organizations. Kate has also been awarded the Harold “Hal” Burrell Freshman Chemistry Achievement Award; and Lucy the H. David Hodgson Outstanding Biology Student Award.

“We are proud of Lucy and Kate’s achievements,” said Kristine D. Duffy, Ed.D., president of SUNY Adirondack. “This is the most recent of several acknowledgments of their remarkable efforts and, I’m sure, there are many more to come.”

The sisters have their own interests – Kate keeps field journals and plays piano and violin, while Lucy sings, acts and practices photography and drawing. Currently, the pair are looking into four-year colleges to transfer to after they graduate this spring. When they do, they will, once again, be going together.

“We’re pretty inseparable,” said Lucy. “We’re very much alike.”