MPI announced its annual RISE Award recipients on Thursday, recognizing meeting and event industry success and excellence by members from across the globe in three individual categories and four chapter categories.
The recipients, announced throughout MPI’s 12-hour Global Meetings Industry Day: Virtual broadcast, will be formally recognized during the World Education Congress, June 15-17 in Las Vegas.
INDIVIDUAL RISE AWARD RECIPIENTS
Member of the Year: Kate Copeland, CMP, CMM, CED (MPI Connecticut River Valley Chapter)
This award is given to an exceptional MPI member who through volunteer efforts has made outstanding grassroots contributions and demonstrated unparalleled commitment to the advancement of a chapter, club, community or region.
Meeting Industry Leadership: Greg Elam (MPI Dallas-Fort Worth Chapter)
This award honors those rare individuals who by visionary hard work and creative insight have positively changed the global meeting and event industry. It recognizes sustained commitment and substantial contributions to the meeting and event community.
Young Professional Achievement: Zaman Ishaad, CED, CMP, DES (MPI Toronto Chapter)
This award recognizes an individual 40 years of age or younger with five or less years of professional experience in the meeting and event industry that has made outstanding contributions to MPI and/or the meeting and event industry.
CHAPTER RISE AWARD RECIPIENTS
Innovative Educational Programming: MPI Caribe Mexicano Chapter
This award recognizes an MPI chapter, club or student club that has created innovative programming which advances the education and professional development of its members.
Marketplace Excellence: MPI Greater New York Chapter
This award recognizes an MPI chapter or club for providing exceptional business exchange for members that demonstrates innovation and creativity in its development, planning and delivery.
Membership Achievement: MPI Italia Chapter
This award recognizes an MPI chapter, club or student club for achievement in membership growth, engagement and retention demonstrated by overall membership numbers or effective campaigns, programming and involvement in activities.
Industry Advocate: MPI Italia Chapter
This award recognizes an MPI chapter, club or student club for achievements in advancing the meeting and event industry by promoting an understanding of its impact, participation in Global Meetings Industry Day or strategic use and implementation of tools and resources provided by the Meetings Mean Business Coalition.
The RISE Awards were established in 2009 and recipients join the MPI Community of Honorees, a group composed of past MPI award winners and distinguished leaders.
Candidates for the award are reviewed by the RISE Awards Judging Panel, an MPI international volunteer committee chaired this year by Cassie Poss (MPI Dallas-Fort Worth Chapter), who received the RISE Award for Young Professional Achievement in 2020. Decisions are ratified by the MPI International Board of Directors (IBOD). Chris Meyer (MPI Southern California Chapter) was the RISE Awards Committee IBOD liaison.
The association received 86 nominations for the 2021 awards covering all categories.
“The RISE Awards have always featured incredible and inspiring examples of leadership, influence and innovation,” Poss says. “This year was no exception to that. The stories told through these applications were awe-inspiring, emotional, unique in nature and diverse. With the meeting and event industry continuing to power through the pandemic, these aspects were even more on display but so was resilience, strength and honestly true grit. It definitely made the job of the committee fulfilling, but it was not an easy task, and one that we all took great pride and care with. The recipients of the various categories embodied and exemplified the essence of the RISE Awards to their fullest extent.”
Copeland, the Member of the Year, is assistant director of university events and conference services at the University of Connecticut, where she oversees a team of nine. She leads the department in event design and strategy and is an expert in technology initiatives, including Cvent, Gather and virtual event platforms.
She has been heavily involved in MPI since joining in 2011. She was awarded the MPI Connecticut River Valley President’s Award for exceptional service to the chapter in 2014, and served as chapter president in 2015-2016. During her term, the chapter achieved its highest member satisfaction results in five years, increased member recruitment by 83 percent, tripled the number of volunteers and grew adjusted gross margin by 20 percent. She has continued to volunteer at both the chapter level and on various MPI Global committees and task forces, currently serving on the MPI Chapter & Membership Advisory Council and the Facilitator and Chapter Training sub-committee.
The MPI RISE Awards: Celebrating the spirit of leadership, impact and innovation. Learn more.
Elam, honored with the Meeting Industry Leadership award, is a 42-year MPI lifetime member.
In the 1950s, he was the youngest national executive director of a major college social fraternity in the U.S. (Pi Kappa Phi) and went on to spend 25 years in life insurance as an executive in public relations, sales promotion and communications. He organized incentive trips and conferences around the world.
Elam was president of the MPI Dallas-Fort Worth Chapter in 1980-1981 and served on the IBOD. He was MPI’s International Meeting Planner of the Year in 1986-87. Elam had a role in MPI’s move to Dallas, as he was the welcoming speaker at the move-in date and was program chair of the first MPI convention. He also was instrumental is changing the organization’s name from Meeting Planners International.
Ishaad, a meetings consultant and event designer based in Toronto, joined MPI in 2015 as a student member seeking career development opportunities and became a full member in 2019. He has served on his chapter leadership board as the director of finance and globally has served on the Canadian Advisory Council and the Anti-Human Trafficking Committee—and currently, serves on the Young Professionals Advisory Council.
He was previously honored with the 2019 Rising Star Award at the Canadian Meetings & Events Expo! His accomplishments include planning meetings on five continents, hosting Orientation Week for more than 2,500 students and securing more than $80,000 in sponsorships.
The MPI Caribe Mexicano Chapter, which was recognized with a RISE Award in 2020 for Membership Achievement, is being honored with this year’s award for Innovative Educational Programming.
Each year, the chapter strategizes to produce educational and social events for the interests of suppliers and planners, and its March 2020 program had to be adapted to the global pandemic situation in order to continue creating educational and wellness content and stronger communication between buyers, suppliers, government institutions and private corporations. MPI Caribe Mexicano developed a strategy as a chapter to apply digital platforms for virtual and hybrid events, looking to retain and show the industry that it could adopt.
Additionally, MPI Caribe Mexicano implemented a program to support a local shelter housing 18 minors who had been removed from their families due to domestic violence, and three single moms.
“The recipients of the various categories embodied and exemplified the essence of the RISE Awards to their fullest extent.”
The MPI Greater New York Chapter was honored for Marketplace Excellence.
Last October, the chapter held its inaugural Education & Expo, referred to as EdX. The program introduced a state-of-the-art, alternate virtual platform for industry-leading education, enhanced networking and live entertainment during the heart of the COVID-19 pandemic. The event aligned with the chapter’s education theme of Adapting-Shift Happens, which was woven throughout EdX. The event concluded by celebrating the MPIGNY Annual Genie Awards with a live production from the Shubert New World Stages in the heart of Times Square.
The MPI Italia Chapter received two RISE Awards, Membership Achievement and Industry Advocate.
For Membership Achievement, the chapter was nominated for becoming the largest European Chapter, including boosting membership of students by nearly 40 percent while keeping the number of members stable during the COVID pandemic. Overall, from June 2019 to June 2020, the chapter acquired 42 new fulltime members to reach 174.
The chapter also received the Industry Advocate award. Italy was one of the first nations in Europe hit by the COVID pandemic and established together with other associations and clubs “ItaliaLive” to represent and protect the interests of the entire meeting industry.
MPI Italia was very active in cooperating with the other national and international associations to prepare a manifesto with specific requests to the government, organizing a peaceful and well-structured protest in front of the Italian Parliament and requesting to open a permanent dialogue with the government. The chapter was invited to participate in a discussion at the Economic Ministry on the needs of our Industry.
