APHL Honors 2025 Annual Award Winners

For Immediate Release

Portland, Oregon, May 7, 2025 – The Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL) is pleased to announce the winners of its annual awards for outstanding achievements in laboratory science, creative approaches to solving today’s public health challenges and exemplary support of laboratories serving the public’s health. Awardees were honored on May 7, 2025 at the APHL Annual Conference in Portland, OR. Congratulations to all award winners!

The following awards were presented:

Lifetime Achievement Award – This award recognizes individuals who have established a history of distinguished service to APHL, made significant contributions to the advancement of public health laboratory science or practice, exhibited leadership in the field of public health and/or positively influenced public health policy on a national or global level. This is not a retirement award, but a true Lifetime Achievement Award.

• Burton Wilke, emeritus associate professor, University of Vermont

Gold Standard Award – The award is given to an APHL member who makes or has made significant contributions to the technical advancement of public health laboratory science and/or practice.

• Kirsten St. George, chief, Laboratory of Viral Diseases, New York State Department of Health Wadsworth Center

Silver Award – This award honors a laboratorian with 10 to 15 years of service in a governmental public health laboratory. The honoree will be recognized as a leader both within their home laboratory as well as external to their laboratory. This year there are two Silver Award winners.

• Will Probert, research scientist supervisor, California Department of Public Health
• Suzanne Stanton, biomonitoring coordinator, chemist V, Vermont Department of Health Laboratory

On the Front Line Award – This award honors an individual or laboratory outside of the APHL membership who makes significant contributions to the advancement of public health laboratory science and/or practice. This year there are two winners.

• Food Emergency Response Network program staff, Food Safety and Inspection Service, US Department of Agriculture (USDA)
• Food Emergency Response Network and Laboratory Flexible Funding Model program staff, US Food and Drug Administration (FDA)

Emerging Leader Award – The Emerging Leader Award honors an individual whose leadership has been instrumental in one or more advances in laboratory science, practice, management, policy or education early in their career.

• Jasmine Guillet, division director of health safety and training, Massachusetts State Public Health Laboratory

Leadership in Biosafety and Biosecurity Award – This award honors a laboratorian with over 10 years of related service in the field of biosafety and biosecurity in a state and/or local public health laboratory. The honoree will be recognized as a leader both within their home laboratory as well as external to their laboratory (for example, by serving in a leadership role in committees/taskforces at the national level).

• Peter Iwen, director, Nebraska Public Health Laboratory

LEAD Award – This award, established in 2021, recognizes the legacy of Eva J. Perlman, APHL’s first chief learning officer, who over three decades helped shape the public health laboratory workforce and represented the attributes of ‘serving those who have served.’ This award honors an individual who exhibits the attributes of a leader, encourager, advocate and developer, and who has 10 or more years of service in a state, local or territorial public health laboratory, or other public health laboratory partner. This year there are two LEAD Award winners.

• Erin Bowles, Wisconsin State Laboratory of Hygiene (retired)
• Lori Pillsbury, laboratory administrator, Oregon Department of Environmental Quality

Presidential Award – The APHL Presidential Award winners were selected by Dr. Megan Crumpler during her Presidential year (2024-2025) for the significant contributions that were made to the association’s work to promote policies that strengthen public health laboratories. Dr. Crumpler chose one outstanding individual and one outstanding group for this year’s Presidential Award.

• Mandy Cohen, director, US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2023-2025)
• APHL Incident Command Team for the 2025 Fiscal Crisis

Healthiest Laboratory Award – This award is given to an APHL member laboratory that is committed to safety, environmental process, environmental policy and employee health and wellness.

• State jurisdictional award winner: California Department of Public Health Center for Laboratory Sciences
• Local jurisdictional award winner: San Diego County Public Health Laboratory

Award for Outstanding Contribution to Workforce, Training and Continuing Education – The Award for Outstanding Contribution to Workforce, Training and Continuing Education honors an individual who has made significant contributions to the advancement of workforce development and training in public health laboratory science and practice; worked to provide continuing education opportunities, programs, policies or practices internally and/or through outreach to public health partners; or demonstrated a history of service with APHL committees, taskforces or workgroups focused on workforce development, continuing education or training.

• Susan Mikorski, laboratory outreach program manager, New Jersey Department of Health Public Health and Environmental Laboratories

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The Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL) works to strengthen laboratory systems serving the public’s health in the US and globally. APHL’s member laboratories protect the public’s health by monitoring and detecting infectious and foodborne diseases, environmental contaminants, terrorist agents, genetic disorders in newborns and other diverse health threats. Learn more at https://www.aphl.org/.

Contact Michelle Forman at 240.485.2793 or [email protected]