Teenage slang "schiznick/shiz" (= great, cool)--Query

[Vida J Morkunas]

I heard it on the Old Navy ads, featuring the actress who once starred in
The Nanny.  She says the word at the end of one ad (sitting at a 1950's
telephone operator station, if I remember correctly).

These ads aired on Canadian TV before Christmas.

I'd like to understand the origin of this word - it sounds Yiddish, but is
obviously not. Perhaps a hip-hop term?

Cheers - Vida.
-----Original Message-----
From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU]On Behalf Of
Gerald Cohen
Sent: Tuesday, February 03, 2004 6:16 PM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Teenage slang "schiznick/shiz" (= great, cool)--Query

A former student just sent me an e-mail about a new teenage-slang
term I had never heard of. Is anyone else familiar with it? Might
anyone know its etymology?

     Excerpts of her message appear below my signoff.

Gerald Cohen

[message I received from a former student]:
>...I thought you might want to know a new word I've been hearing
>from my four teenagers and their friends. See if it's original or
>means something else or has just been out there all along and we
>didn't know it. I don't know the spelling but I'll try. It's
>scheznick, maybe schiznic or something like that. Then it's just
>shiz for short. It's pronounced like schiz/nick. This word means
>something like great-cool-fantastic. ...  Anyway they use it when
>describing a teacher they like or when something they have done was
>really fun. "Hey Mom, do you know Mr. Smith? He's the schiz". I have
>heard it so much I thought you might already know about it. ...