RS&H Congratulates 2024 Annual Associate Award Winners
[Jacksonville, FL] – Each year, RS&H honors and celebrates associates who have made especially significant contributions to the firm through the Annual Associate Awards program. These five individuals were nominated by their peers and leaders and have shown outstanding leadership in their field and/or community. Each category is a little different, highlighting one or more of RS&H’s core values and how that individual emphasized the driven to care mindset.
Excellence in Project Delivery wouldn’t be the same without Paige LaBarr, PE. She continuously builds trustworthy relationships with our clients throughout Texas, providing consistently stellar service. LaBarr is a newly appointed Texas State Leader for RS&H’s Construction Management Business Unit; she notes that her motto is “If it’s important to the client, it’s important to me,” which has surely served her and her team well. She continues, “I am incredibly honored to have been nominated and selected to receive this award. … It reminds me that going above and beyond, even when no one is looking truly does make an impact. Receiving this award is also a reflection of the mentorship I’ve received from Kirk Fauri and others as well as the support of my teammates, always pushing me and pushing the boundaries of what it means to provide best-in-class service”.
LaBarr is an extremely dedicated associate with many responsibilities, but she always makes time for her family, going for bike rides and walks and to the park with her young daughter, husband, and dog.
Community Impact Award winner Nicole Nasi, PE, is incredibly intertwined with her Denver, CO, community and RS&H coworkers. She volunteers to tutor and coach high school students and is a driver in planning engaging activities with the Denver office, including potlucks, team outings, and other fun events. Nasi demonstrates the driven to care essence of RS&H by simply showing up. “Showing up to the office, showing up for my co-workers and friends when needed, showing up for the client to listen to their needs and strive to best meet those needs, and also showing up to give back to the community around me. I strive to be a reliable source to all those around me, and that starts with showing up.” Says Nasi.
Nasi is a bright light in the Denver office and a stellar aviation engineer for our clients. So far, one of her biggest accomplishments at RS&H has been completing the EUG Taxiways C and M rehabilitation project and the EUG Remain Overnight Apron and Fiber Optics Transmission System (FOTS) Relocation project. She says, “…I had a bigger design role than I had been used to and grew a lot as a technical designer. After the design phase was completed, I had the opportunity to play a bigger role in the construction for both projects…being a part of the project from the beginning, successfully through the end of construction, was a great accomplishment for me and my career”.
All that hard work calls for a break! Nasi’s go-to recharge activity is “tea time” with her fellow associates, where they break away from their desks to make a fresh cup of tea and chat, reviving their morning or mid-afternoon work day.
The Technical Excellence Award recognizes outstanding technical deliverables to clients and demonstrates an in-depth understanding of their discipline as a subject matter expert. This year’s award goes to Alan Littlefield, PE, who always makes himself available to mentor and support fellow associates through the expertise and insights gained over his career.
Littlefield is a senior principal mechanical engineer out of RS&H’s Merritt Island office. By location, he works on many of our aerospace projects. One of his favorite projects with RS&H has been the Design of the Stabilization System for NASA’s Space Launch System Block 1B rocket.
Littlefield is known throughout the firm for his exceptional attention to detail and says that “receiving this award means that my efforts, skills, and knowledge are recognized and appreciated by my [fellow] associates.”
David Bemporad, AICP is this year’s Rising Star! In just one year, David has made incredible contributions to RS&H’s Texas transportation planning team, helping complete two roadway safety action plans within the new federally encouraged Safe Streets and Roads for All (SS4A) Plans, and developing a unique GIS-based crash analysis method, bringing a new meaning to “future-forward” thinking from our associates.
Bemporad says he is “so proud to have been a part of developing new methods for crash data analysis, expansive municipal code reviews, community engagement design and planning, and a new method for project scoring that balanced all a city’s competing priorities as a part of these plans.”
David takes a lot of pride in his work. He says it is rewarding knowing RS&H supports him, “I am extremely encouraged by being selected for this award because it shows that the whole company is looking at our team’s amazing and progressive contributions here in Texas and is as proud of them as we are. The hope I feel from receiving this award is rooted in RS&H’s recognition of the importance of looking holistically at our projects – beyond the right-of-way and project site to all the parts of our communities – to fulfill our company’s commitment to roadway safety.”
The Values in Action Award is awarded to the associate who consistently exemplifies RS&H’s values; integrity, creativity, inclusivity, care, forward-thinking, and ownership. National Bridge Inspection & Preservation Leader Corey Rogers, PE, is this year’s Values in Action winner, building a culture of care with his team members and having a positive, can-do attitude. Rodgers has leaned into the value of forward-thinking by creating a non-destructive testing group, helping diversify our construction services.
One of Rogers’ greatest accomplishments that he shares with his coworkers is establishing a strong presence in the Dallas-Fort Worth area among a plethora of clientele. Rogers says that this award “means a lot knowing that my crew contributed to the nomination. Our motto is to do the right thing when it comes to bridge inspections, even if it involves uncomfortable conversations or bridge closure recommendations. Being recognized for the values we implement both personally and professionally means I must be doing something right”.
To keep Rogers’ workday productive and model care and creativity to his associates, he likes to take walks outdoors to get some sun, other times he hits a quick workout or starts prepping for dinner since he loves to cook.
Congratulations to our 2024 Annual Associate Award Winners!
About RS&H
Employee-owned, RS&H is one of the nation’s leading architecture, engineering and consulting firms whose associates work hard every day to create a more connected future where everyone can thrive. We offer an exceptional journey from start to future for clients in the aerospace, aviation, corporate, federal, healthcare and science, and transportation markets. Our integrated teams translate experience into insight, turn challenges into opportunities and build relationships as strong as the buildings and infrastructure we deliver together.