SUNY Empire Foundation Award Winners Announced at All College

Congratulations to the 10 individuals who were recognized at the Empire State University Foundation Award Ceremony at All College 2023. These awards recognize the achievements of SUNY Empire’s faculty and staff. Award recipients are nominated by colleagues or others in the college community and chosen by committee.  

Here is a list of this year’s winners and what colleagues and students had to say about them:

Excellence in Support Service: Mallory Holman and Michele Lee

Mallory’s work ethic and work product consistently exceed expectations, and her skills grow in strength and number year over year. She is always a step ahead, reliable, and approaches her work and life with a smile, kindness, and a sense of humor. Among her colleagues, she is known as the “shadow AVP" — the one behind the scenes who keeps everything running smoothly. Her team says Mallory is “a rare gem,” and that their office and the university as a whole are better because of her.

Michele’s colleagues say her work consistently exceeds expectations and that she is mission- and student-focused in her work, whether she’s working with prospective students and applicants directly, processing graduate applications and transcripts, or co-convening School for Graduate Studies monthly meetings.

Excellence in Professional Service: Emilie Masiello and Ashley Mason

Emilie is known for her leadership inside and outside the School of Business. Her colleagues describe her as a trusted advisor and student advocate, whose high standards and willingness to help make her a university-wide asset. She does consistently exemplary work in her role as a director of academic review, as a professional member of the School of Business, and as part of Empire State University’s governance in support of the institution’s mission, vision, and values

Ashley always puts the student experience first. She is at the center of SUNY Empire’s student outreach initiatives, working diligently to remove complexities and barriers that can impede a student’s success. She’s a powerful advocate for our students who also goes above and beyond to support her colleagues across the university. Her colleagues describe her someone who continuously develops innovative programs and service methods to meet the ever-changing needs of our students.

Hall Innovation Award: Kelly Cattron

Kelly’s colleagues say she has been instrumental in the development, refinement, and innovation related to online course offerings in the university’s newly structured and registered psychology program. In her capacity as associate department chair, Kelly played a key role in the expansion of courses for the online program offered by SUNY and diligently and meticulously enhanced our psychology course offerings to meet the needs of our expanding and thriving psychology program.

Altes Prize for Exemplary Community Service: Jenny Mincin

Jenny has dedicated her life and career to providing humanitarian aid, disaster services, and programs for refugees and other vulnerable populations. Most recently, she was involved in the evacuation of people in Kabul after U.S. forces withdrew from Afghanistan and the Taliban seized control of the country. As an associate professor in the School of Human Services, she has taught and published extensively about refugees and displaced groups; crisis prevention and intervention; disaster mental health, and social welfare and policy. Jenny is now involved in helping Ukrainian refugees. Last November, she offered workshops on working with Ukrainian refugees to a nonprofit in Galway, Ireland. During her sabbatical, she will collaborate with the International Rescue Committee and the Irish Refugee Council on how to support Syrian, Ukrainian, and African refugee and asylee programs.

Turben Chair in Mentoring: Elizabeth Bradley

In 2014, Elizabeth founded the Graduate Student Research and Professional Development Committee with the goal of making faculty research mentorships, grants, conferences, and publication opportunities more accessible to graduate students. She succeeded. Thanks to her efforts and passion for graduate student research, our students have presented at national conferences, published in peer-reviewed journals, and gone on to pursue doctoral studies.

Turben Excellence in Scholarship: Joanne Levine

Since arriving at SUNY Empire in 2014, Joanne has infused her scholarly interests — including the use of technology in human services, medical marijuana, and aging — into her teaching and mentoring. Her interdisciplinary course on medical marijuana was the first course on this topic in the SUNY system. In addition to course development, teaching, and mentoring, she is editing a book and working on the second phase of a research project on meeting the educational needs of older students. A prolific writer throughout her career, she co-authored “Working with People,” a textbook for social work students that has been in print since 2002

Excellence in Mentoring Award:  Carrie Steinman

Carrie provided counseling services for adolescents and their families on mental health and substance-use treatment, assisted homeless and runaway youth with therapeutic treatment services, and developed statewide training on adolescents and children in foster care and the juvenile justice system. She brings more than 20 years of practitioner experience to her work at SUNY Empire, and her expertise is an asset to students she teaches and mentees she supports through the iPLA and degree planning processes. An advocate for social change, she is passionate about DEI initiatives and works to ensure that historically marginalized students have access to prior learning assessments.

Excellence in Part-Time Mentoring: Matthew Schmidt

Matt is known as a collaborator who works with other faculty to develop creative learning experiences. A dedicated naturalist, he was instrumental in working with external partners from local, state, and county governments and organizations to create a five-acre community nature trail behind our Selden location. He is now leading efforts to turn that trail into a living laboratory for students who want to do applied field research in conservation, ecology, and environmental geosciences

Congratulations to all the award recipients!