NWRC Awards

2008 Awards – USGS National Wetlands Research Center

Each year the regions recognize employees for USGS honor awards and length of service awards, as well as for awards given by outside agencies and organizations.

Larry Allain

Received the center's Leading from Any Chair Award for his leadership in the Louisiana Native Plant Initiative, a multi-State and Federal agency partnership to expand the quality and diversity of native seed stock for coastal wetland and prairie restoration.

Wylie Barrow

Co-authored the publication “Vanishing Before Our Eyes: Louisiana Cheniere Woods and the Birds that Depend on Them,” which received an award of excellence from the Houston chapter of the Society for Technical Communication and a national award of distinction from the Society.

Christina Boudreaux

Received a first-place award from the National Association of Government Communicators for design of conference materials for the International Delta Roundtable meeting.

Virginia Burkett

Shared in the Nobel Peace Prize as contributor to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
Received the Southeastern Regional Director’s Conservation Award from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Atlanta for work on climate change and for helping natural resource managers understand and anticipate potential impacts in the southeastern United States.

Craig Conzelmann

Received a Wings Across the America Award from the U.S. Forest Service for his creation of an application for the lower Mississippi Valley and Central Hardwoods Joint Ventures that allowed modelers of habitat for 40 priority bird species to run model replicates in two days rather than 60.

Carroll Cordes

Received the Lower Mississippi Valley Joint Venture’s Conservation Service Award in recognition for his contributions and service as a member of the Joint Venture’s Management Board.

Gaye Farris

Will receive a Shoemaker award from USGS for internal communications: the speech, “Communicating During a Disaster: the Professional and Personal.”
Received a first place award for this same speech from the National Association of Government Communicators
Was named a Gulf Guardian Award from USEPA’s Gulf of Mexico Program for service and support in communicating about the Gulf of Mexico
Was honored by the National Association of Communicators by their naming its annual scholarship for communications students the Gaye Farris Scholarship.

Larry Handley

30 years length of service

Leslie Holland

Received the 2007 Reserve Affairs Family Readiness Award from the Department of Defense for Military Support for her volunteer work as a family-support coordinator for the U.S. Coast Guard Reserve’s Port Security Unit 308. Only one award per year is given to each of the service branches.

Karen McKee

Selected as a 2008 Society of Wetland Scientist Honor Fellow for 30-year contributions to the field of wetland science. This is the highest recognition of membership bestowed up on the society and only a third of one percent of members receive this recognition.

Debbie Norling

Received the 2008 Central Region Diversity Award, Individual category. More Information

Scott Wilson

Recognized by the University of Louisiana at Lafayette for his outstanding work as project leader of Team Cajunbot in the 2004, 2005, and 2007 Grand Challenges of robotic cars sponsored by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) of the U.S. Defense Department.

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