Member Awards

ACUA Awards

• Member Excellence in Service Award - This Award recognizes a member who has made outstanding contributions to the mission of ACUA through exceptional service.

• Outstanding Professional Contributions Award - This Award recognizes a member who has made outstanding and noteworthy contributions to the profession of internal auditing in higher education.

• Rising Star Award - This Award recognizes an “up-and-coming” member who has made significant individual contributions in the areas of internal audit, compliance, or risk management that furthers the mission of ACUA.

Please contact info@acua.org if you have any questions. 

2023 Award Recipients 

Member Excellence in Service Award 2023

Justin Noble, Virginia Tech

Justin was nominated for his outstanding service to ACUA and its members for over 15 years. Along with Justin’s other contributions, he served as ACUA’s President in 2018-19, continues to be actively involved with various committees, and holds an appointment to the ACUA Faculty. Justin has dedicated much of himself to ACUA and is valued as a content creator, outstanding speaker, and advocate for the profession of internal auditing in higher education. Justin’s official leadership roles for ACUA have been as the Distance Learning Chairman (2012-14), Board Member-at-Large (2014-17), Vice President (2017-18), President, (2018-19), Immediate Past President and Nominating Committee Chair (2019-20).  During his board service, Justin spearheaded the reimagination of ACUA’s conference offerings, including the rebranding from Annual to AuditCon and Midyear to Audit Interactive., Additionally, Justin has been an active speaker for ACUA for over 10 years on many topics and is known as a resident expert on NCAA Athletics Compliance. He is highly regarded as an outstanding speaker per session evaluations and his sessions are well attended for ACUA. Justin is always willing to serve other members of the ACUA family. Justin has been a long-standing speaker at ACUA Midyear and developed two courses for the 2.5 day conference, including Deep in the Heart of NCAA Compliance and Essential Skills for In-Charge Auditors, in addition to continuing to volunteer as a speaker at AI and AuditCon. Justin has authored 6 professional publications for ACUA, EDUCAUSE, and local chapters for IIA and AICPA on institutional data reporting, athletics, QAIP, organizational excellence, and internal audit being a trusted resource. Further, he is active on Connect ACUA offering insight to ACUA members. Justin developed the KickStarter program, identified the content elements for each guide, and designed the layout template to ensure ACUA was delivering higher education, audit specific information to our members. Justin recruited the first several volunteers to author KickStarters in 2018 and authored the NCAA Compliance: Eligibility, Financial Aid, and Recruiting KickStarter in November 2020. He has volunteered to serve on quality assurance reviews across the nation.  In this role, he spends countless hours providing service to ACUA members and offering his expertise. Furthermore, he has an “open door” policy with other ACUA members, and many other members reach out to him on a regular basis for advice on higher education risks and audit approaches, especially those related to NCAA and Athletics. 
 

Carolyn was nominated for her exceptional contributions to the internal auditing profession for over 20 years. Carolyn has devoted her career in public accounting, corporations, and higher education to being a key leader in enhancing and protecting organizational value by providing risk based and objective assurance, advice, and insight. Carolyn has dedicated much of her volunteer time to the Institute of Internal Auditors’ (IIA) to advocate for the profession of internal auditing in North America and globally. An active advocate for the internal auditing profession, Carolyn has chaired the Institute of Internal Auditors’ (IIA) North American Board of Directors, served as an IIA global board member, and was a member of the IIA Research Foundation Board of Trustees. She most recently served as IIA Global Advocacy chair, where she led the creation of the IIA’s global advocacy platform. Carolyn is also active as a peer member of QAR teams, offering feedback, advice and guidance on continuous improvement opportunities under the IIA standards, as well as insightful recommendations for ensuring the value of the assurance function to the institution. Carolyn is a member of the advisory board for ACL, a software development company headquartered in Vancouver Canada. She also serves on the volunteer boards of Leadership Charlottesville Alumni Association and the American Red Cross Central & Shenandoah Virginia. Carolyn is one of the most influential leaders in the internal auditing profession and many turn to her for guidance and counsel as a peer mentor, professional mentor and thoughtful colleague.  Her dedication to serving as an advocate for the internal auditing profession (regardless of industry) makes her particularly and uniquely deserving of this award.  

Rising Star Awards 2023

Erica Smith , Columbia State Community College System
Erica has been a volunteer on the Professional Education Committee for the last three years. In that time, she has, and continues to, contribute selflessly to the internal audit profession, and works tirelessly to further the mission of ACUA. After serving as a valuable member of the 2021 Audit Interactive Planning Committee, Erica graciously accepted the role of Audit Interactive Conference Director, while serving as president of her local IIA Chapter.  During her term as Conference Director, Erica helped to spearhead the return to in-person conferences, increased conference attendance, and was instrumental in implementing multiple partnerships (URMIA and IIA), all while earning a degree in Cybersecurity! When the opportunity to pick a new PEC Chair arose, Erica was the obvious choice. She truly is a rising star!