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The BEYA Gala is set to take place on February 17, 2024, and it will honor a group of exceptional Black engineers who have made significant contributions in various categories of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). These honorees are inventors, innovators, and leaders in their respective fields.
The gala evening will culminate in the Passing the Torch program, where the top winner of the year, Dr. Ken Washington, the senior vice president and chief technology & innovation officer at Medtronic, will be recognized. Recently, BEYA revealed the complete list of 2024 winners in over 15 categories.
Below is a list of the winners of different awards in the field of engineering and technology. The list includes the names of the recipients of each award, along with their job titles and the organizations they work for.
ADMIRAL MICHELLE HOWARD LEGACY AWARD
- Sharon Parish - Director, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility, Department of Navy, Naval Sea Systems Command
CALVIN G. BUTLER JR. LEGACY AWARD
- Sunita Benson-Agwu - Manager Project Execution, Pepco Holdings
DAVID STEWARD LEGACY AWARD
- Tracy Barnes - Chief Information Officer, State of Indiana
DR. CHRISTOPHER T. JONES LEGACY AWARD
- Gilbert “Chip” Jones III, D.M. - Staff Engineer Systems Architect, Northrop Grumman Corporation
DR. EUGENE M. DELOATCH LEGACY AWARD
- Veronica Nelson - Executive Director, Advancing Minorities’ Interest in Engineering (AMIE)
DR. LYDIA W. THOMAS LEGACY AWARD
- Asma Abuzaakouk, Ph.D. - Human and Organization Systems, Principal, MITRE
DR. VICTOR R. MCCRARY JR. LEGACY AWARD
- Angelys Cuello - Clinical Engineer II, Abbott
GENERAL JOHNNIE WILSON LEGACY AWARD
- Tiffany Spence - General Engineer, Missile Defense Agency
GERALD JOHNSON LEGACY AWARD
- Ron Williams - Senior Vice President and General Manager, Jacobs
JOHN D. HARRIS II LEGACY AWARD
- Wayne Richards Jr., DBA - Senior Manager, Program Management, Raytheon, an RTX Business
LINDA GOODEN LEGACY AWARD
- Michael Patton Jr. - Vice President, Program Management, Lockheed Martin Corporation
RODNEY ADKINS LEGACY AWARD
- Bertrand Damiba - Director, Product Management, Google
VICE ADM. MELVIN WILLIAMS JR. LEGACY AWARD
- Kamal Mohamed - Ship Manager, General Dynamics Electric Boat
WALT W. BRAITHWAITE LEGACY AWARD
- Robert McMeans - Manager, Spirit AeroSystems
BLACK ENGINEER OF THE YEAR
- Ken Washington, Ph.D. - Senior Vice President and Chief Technology & Innovation Officer, Medtronic
CAREER ACHIEVEMENT IN GOVERNMENT
- Andrea Williams - Chief, Operations Division, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers - Carl Donahoo - Lead Engineer, Joint Program Office, Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile and Long Range Anti-Ship Missile, Air Force Lifecycle Management Center E-BE
CAREER ACHIEVEMENT IN INDUSTRY
- George Coles Jr. - Biomechanical and Microelectronics Engineer, The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory - William Johnson Jr. - SVP Logistics & Mission Support Operations, Leidos
COMMUNITY SERVICE IN GOVERNMENT
- Tony Harris - Systems Engineer, DEVCOM Analysis Center
COMMUNITY SERVICE IN INDUSTRY
- Eric Biribuze - Global Sales Director, AGS, Corning Incorporated - Anthony Crutchfield - Vice President, Army Systems, The Boeing Company
DAVE BARCLAY AFFIRMATIVE ACTION
- Allan Sonsteby, Ph.D. - Executive Director, Penn State Applied Research Lab - Duran Gunter - Director, Quality & Process Engineering, Pratt Whitney, an RTX Business
GEM OUTSTANDING YOUNG ALUMNUS
- Nashlie Sephus, Ph.D. - Tech Evangelist/Senior Scientist at Amazon, AL, Amazon
LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD
- Howard McKenzie - Chief Engineer and Executive Vice President of Engineering, Test & Technology, The Boeing Company
MOST PROMISING ENGINEER IN GOVERNMENT
- Lowell Jones - Aerospace Engineer, Air Force Materiel Command
MOST PROMISING ENGINEER IN INDUSTRY
- Nirupama (Pam) Bhattacharya, Ph.D. - Principal Data Scientist, MITRE - Nicole Jackson, Ph.D. - R&D S&E Systems Research and Analysis, Sandia National Laboratories
MOST PROMISING SCIENTIST
- Shavonn Watkins, Ph.D. - Associate, Booz Allen Hamilton - Connie Kim - Health Program Analysis and Transformation, Lead, MITRE
OUTSTANDING TECHNICAL CONTRIBUTION IN GOVERNMENT
- Nathaniel Bridges, Ph.D. - Research Biomedical Engineer, Air Force Research Laboratory - Chad Nash - Chief, QRC Branch, U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command
OUTSTANDING TECHNICAL CONTRIBUTION IN INDUSTRY
- Tresha Lacaux - Vice President & 777X Chief Project Engineer, The Boeing Company - Christa Wright, Ph.D. - Research Director, CIRI of UL Research Institutes
PIONEER AWARD
- Matice Wright-Springer - Senior Vice President, Booz Allen Hamilton
PROFESSIONAL ACHIEVEMENT IN GOVERNMENT
- Maj Roderick Ervin - Chief, Program Integration Branch, United States Air Force - LTC Michael Pope - Deputy Commander, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
PROFESSIONAL ACHIEVEMENT IN INDUSTRY
- Nelson Akwari, Ph.D. - Director, Interiors Responsibility Center South Carolina, The Boeing Company - Brandon Cassimere, Ph.D. - Senior Technical Professional Leader, KBR
RESEARCH LEADERSHIP
- Katherine Kim, Ph.D. - Consumer Health Informatics, Principal, MITRE
SENIOR INVESTIGATOR
- Rigobert Tibi, Ph.D. - R&D S&E Geosciences Engineering, Sandia National Laboratories - Sridevi Polavaram, Ph.D. - Senior Artificial Intelligence Engineer, MITRE
SENIOR TECHNOLOGY FELLOW
- William Agassounon, Ph.D. - Director, Research & Advanced Systems, Textron Systems
STUDENT LEADERSHIP – UNDERGRADUATE LEVEL
- Jabari Bowen - Cadet, U.S. Air Force Academy Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
TECHNICAL SALES AND MARKETING
- Victor Deal - Senior Program Manager, Business Development, HII
VISIONARY AWARD
- Anthony Brown, Esq. - Attorney General, Maryland State Government