2022 NORDP Rising Star Award Winners

The National Organization of Research Development Professionals (NORDP) is pleased to announce the 2022 winners of the Rising Star Award. Each year, the Rising Star Award recognizes NORDP members who have made outstanding volunteer contributions to NORDP. Nominations for this award may be submitted by any NORDP member. The 2022 Rising Star Awardees are Daniel Arriaga, Kelsey Hassevoort, Becca Latimer, Kim Patten and Josh Roney. 

Daniel Arriaga: Daniel is involved in multiple NORDP committees, including the Professional Development committee, the Communications Working Group, and the Mentoring Committee; he was recently featured as a Career Stories Fireside Chat speaker in Dec, 2021 and was tapped to moderate future Fireside Chats; he also played a crucial role this past year in developing & implementing the reboot of NORDP’s Leadership Forum, part of NORDP’s Strategic Plan. 

Kelsey Hassevoort: has been representing Committee for Inclusive Excellence (CIE) on the Communications Working Group, and she is the rising chair of CWG. she also serves on Professional Development and the NORDP 2022 Conference Planning Committee. Her nominator writes that “she truly embodies the spirit of the Rising Star award. In her brief time as an RD professional and NORDP member, she’s already gained a nuanced understanding of our organization, how to navigate its structures to best promote NORDP’s mission, and how to promote NORDP to both our members and to an external audience.”

Becca Latimer: Becca is a dedicated NORDP member and volunteer leader for the organization and has been critical in supporting NORDP’s business and mission. She has served as a co-chair of the Professional Development Committee since 2019. Becca was also committed to the 2021-2022 Peer Mentoring Group (PMG) for Leadership Engagement and Development (LEAD) and engaged in the 2021 Leadership Forum. She is a mentor to NORDP members and a mentee. Becca was a member of the 2020 Salary Survey Committee, co-chaired the Sponsorship Committee in 2019-2020. She is one of our hard-working conference co-chairs this year, and will be the lead co-chair for the 2023 conference.

Kim Patten: Kim served five years on the Nominating Committee, chairing/co-chairing the committee from 2019 through 2021, and she participated in the Mentoring Committee’s mentoring program as both a mentee and mentor. Currently, Kim serves as Strategic Alliances Committee co-liaison to the NSF-funded Center for Advancing Research Impact in Society (ARIS). As ARIS co-liaison, she was key to developing the Memorandum of Understanding that was announced to both communities in November. Kim also has led the effort to bring agency Program Officers to NORDP conferences for the benefit of our attendees.

Josh Roney: Has spent about 5 years on the Professional Development Committee, where he is a current co-chair, and the recent lead for the Production Working Group. He has developed SOPs to ensure that webinars run smoothly and has trained up volunteers to be savvy tech hosts. He recently volunteered to coordinate the virtual NORDP Holiday Party that was held in December. On a local level, he was a founding member and has served in leadership roles for the Florida NORDP group, which addresses common RD challenges for Florida universities and which met twice annually in person (before COVID) and which has monthly virtual meetings