Awards and Honors
We are a group of dedicated scientists, economists and teachers who go above and beyond expectations everyday. And we take time every year to recognize and honor our team for their effort and commitment to creating solutions that will benefit agriculture and our future.


Career Award
Dawn Thilmany
Named AAEA Fellow – Dr. Dawn Thilmany announced as a 2023 Fellow of the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association. This recognition acknowledges the highest quality work for professional advancement in, and dissemination of, knowledge about agricultural, development, environmental, food and consumer, natural resource, regional, rural, and associated areas of applied economics and business. Dawn has provided significant, positive impacts in all of these areas across the pillars of the land-grant mission. She is so deserving of the AAEA’s most prestigious honor.

Research Award
Jude Bayham
CSU Office of the Vice President for Research 2022 Interdisciplinary Scholarship Individual Award. This honor recognizes Dr. Bayham’s interdisciplinary scholarship that demonstrates the relevance, impact, and breadth of work related to wildfire management and economic epidemiology of COVID-19. Dr. Bayham’s fire relate work has been used to set U.S. Forest Service fire response policy and his COVID work helped the Colorado Governor’s office and the CSU President’s office implement safety practices during the pandemic.

Engagement Award
Kellie Enns
The College of Agricultural Sciences recognized Kellie Enns with the 2022 Distinguished Community Engagement Scholarship award based on her long-term record and sustained impact in elevating the role of agricultural education in Colorado. As part of her engagement portfolio, Dr. Enns partnered with the Colorado FFA, the Community College of Colorado System, CSU Extension, and others to build the CoBank Center for Agricultural Education at CSU, to develop 4-H programming, and Cam’s academy that provides agricultural education to K-12 students at Spur, state fairs, rural classrooms, and beyond.
Student Awards
2023 Farm Foundation Awards Recipients
Sam Ayoub
Sam will participate in the year-long Scholars Program where she will engage with students across the country on agricultural issues.
Tais de Menezes
Tais was selected as part of the Cultivators program where she will participate in a Round Table meeting. Both will travel to Savannah Georgia for the Farm Foundation Round Table Meetings.
DARE Hall of Fame
In recognition of those individuals with a strong connection to DARE who have made outstanding contributions in their fields. It is the highest honor given by the department and represents the convergence of accomplishment in the lives of our honorees who have:
- Attained prominence through their efforts in agricultural and food economics, natural resources, agricultural education and Extension, agribusiness, ag, food or natural resource policy or other related areas of science, business, education or government and public service.
- A record of impressive accomplishments which indicate significant achievements and contributions at the state, national and/or international level.
- Continued interactions with DARE and the College of Agriculture in student development, community and industry engagement and scholarly programs
2022 Award Recipients Class of 2022
Lifetime Achievement Award
Tomas Miller | Jennie Hughes Popp | Frank Ward | Susanne Scheierling
Early Career Award
Betty Kibaara
Impacts through Partnership Award
Patricia Champ
Impacts through Partnership Award
Jordan Levi

Hall of Fame –Lifetime Achievement
Dr. Jennie Hughes Popp
Year(s) of degree PhD, 1997
- Professor at U of Arkansas with Key Leadership roles including Associate Dean, Honors College and Academic Chair, Service-Learning Initiative
- Area Director of the Center for Agricultural and Rural Sustainability (CARS), where she was selected to be part of the USEPA Farm Ranch and Rural Communities Committee and helped innovate methods for the USEPA and USDA to cooperate to address water quality issues
- Mentored numerous young women scholars in Ag Econ, including two who chose CSU DARE for their PhD and are now faculty, Drs. Jada Thompson (U. of Arkansas) and Misti Sharp (U of Florida)
Frank Ward
Year(s) of degree 1978, 1975, 1970 (all degrees from CSU)
- Professor, Department of Agricultural Economics and Agricultural Business, New Mexico State University
- 2021 Fellow, Western Agricultural Economics Association
- Distinguished Achievement Professor of Water Economics and Policy at New Mexico State University.
- Two books: Ward, F.A. 2006. Environmental and Natural Resource Economics. Prentice‐Hall. And Ward, F.A. and D.J. Beal. 2000. Valuing Nature with Travel Cost Models. Edward Elgar
Susanne Scheierling
Year(s) of degree Ph.D. 1995
- Retired from World Bank in September 2019 as Senior Irrigation Economist, Water Global Practice
- Helped establish Women in Water Network at the World Bank and continued to co-lead that until her retirement from the World Bank
- Dr. Scheierling used her energy, innovation, contacts, and authority to facilitate collaboration among international organizations through international workshops and conferences, initiation of special issues in the professional and policy literature, talks and seminars, and the publication of books and technical/policy papers in leading journals of the profession
Tomas Miller (deceased)
Year(s) of degree PhD 1995
- Formerly Multilateral Investment Fund, Inter-American Development Bank, Chief of Finance and Administration
- His IDB colleagues shared that, “Tomas implemented a strategy at the IDB to: (i) design and fund innovative large-scale programs; and (ii) promote systemic change resulting in the growth of 600 microfinance providers reaching over 10 million low-income clients.”
- Dr. Miller is a credit to DARE who used his skills and education to help hundreds of thousands of Latin American agricultural producers and entrepreneurs by developing strong financial institutions and programs targeting small, rural, and female producers and entrepreneurs.
Hall of Fame-Early Career
Early Career Alumni nominees must be less than 20 years from the receipt of their last degree from CSU.
Betty Kibaara
Year(s) of degree 2005 MS Ag Econ
- Rockefeller Foundation, Director, Good Food Strategy, leading the Foundations investments in transforming food systems, specifically in innovations on smart food markets for the future and access to nutritious foods through institutional procurement.
- Tegemeo Institute of Agricultural Policy and Development, Research Fellow, 2005 – 2009
- Distinguished Alumnus Award, 2022, African American Institute, September 2022
Hall of Fame-Impacts through Partnership
Jordan Levi
- Jordan facilitated Five Rivers Cattle Feeding’s investment in the CSU AgNext effort to study the impact of cattle feeding on the environment and improve the science behind sustainable animal agriculture.
- Jordan donates his time and money to the department to be involved with teaching AREC 419, the new commodities trading course
- Jordan’s philanthropy can be seen through the Beef Sticks for Backpacks effort he created.
Patricia Champ
- US Forest Service Economist for almost thirty years, with the past fifteen years focused on economic issues related to wildfire CSU DARE Faculty affiliate of almost 20 years, commonly guest lecturing for AREC 541/570, serving on numerous search, graduate and other committees in support of the DARE mission and mentoring young women and graduates during an era when there were few women faculty
- One faculty shared, “Patty Champ is an essential and welcome part of the fabric of our department’s culture, reputation and legacy and an important contributor to our growth and continued success”
Awards and Honors
DARE Faculty, Affiliates, and Students
Research
2022 – Jude Bayham – CSU VPR Interdisciplinary Scholarship Individual Award
2022 – Jesse Burkhardt – CSU SoGES Global Challenges Research Team Project
Teaching
2022 – Alessandro Bonanno – CAS Faculty Teaching Award for those with less than 10 Years Teaching Experience at CSU
2020 – Amanda Countryman – AAEA Distinguished Teaching Awards – Less than ten years’ teaching experience
2019 Amanda Countryman – Western Ag Economics Association, Outstanding Undergraduate Teaching Award, less than 10 years
Extension and Engagement
2022 – Kellie Enns – CAS Distinguished Community Engagement Scholarship Award
2020 – Becca Jablonski – AAEA Distinguished Extension/Outreach Awards – Less than ten years’ experience
2020 – Becca Jablonski, Dawn Thilmany, Gregory Graff – CSU Empowering Community Engagement Scholarship Award
2019 – Dawn Thilmany and Allie Bauman – AAEA George Goldman Award for Excellence in Regional Economic Development
Career
2023 – Dawn Thilmany – AAEA Fellow
2022 – Hayley Chouinard – WAEA Fellow
2021 – Dawn Thilmany – CAS Nutrien Distinguished Scholar of Agricultural Sciences
2018 – Dawn Thilmany -WAEA Fellow
2014 – John Loomis – AAEA Fellow
2009 – Dana Hoag – WAEA Fellow
2004 – John Loomis – WAEA Fellow
Graduate Students
2022 – Hailey Edmondson – Food Distribution Research Society Richardson-Applebaum Outstanding Graduate Award for Best M.S. Thesis
2022 – Siddharth Kishore – CSU International Programs Global Impact Award
2021 – Justine Schoenbacher – CAS Charles N. Shepardson Graduate Student Teaching Award
2021 – Gal Koss – John Loomis Outstanding Thesis Award
2021 – Salvador Lurbe – John Loomis Outstanding Dissertation Award
2020 – Jenny Bennett – College of Agricultural Sciences MS Teaching Award
2020 – Partyoosh Kashyap – CSU Graduate Student Council Visual Arts Top Scholar
2019 – Chad Christenson – The Charles M. Tiebout Prize in Regional Science, Graduate MS paper
2019 – Pratyoosh Kashyap – CSU VPR Distinction in Creativity
Undergraduate Students
2019 Haley Dallas – CAS Charles N. Shepardson Student Leadership Award