Parkland Excellence Awards
Each year, Parkland College presents five awards to faculty and staff who demonstrate excellence in their field. Faculty are eligible for the Leadership Award for Outstanding Full-time Faculty, Leadership Award for Outstanding Adjunct Faculty, and the Teaching Excellence Award. Staff are eligible for the Parkland Staff Gold Award and Parkland Staff Green Award.
2023 Winners
2023 Staff Gold Award Winner
Sara Stone
Sara Stone is the Associate Director of the Technology Service Desk in Campus Technologies. This September will be her 20th anniversary at Parkland and she has held three different titles in Campus Tech over the years. Sara loves serving faculty, staff, and students and is extremely proud to be part of the Parkland community. She strives to ensure that the Tech Service Desk is a helpful and welcoming place full of kindness, encouragement, patience, humor, and empathy.
Sara graduated from the University of Illinois in 1999 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting and fell into IT support by happenstance. Even though it was not her planned career path, she is so grateful and glad to be part of the Campus Technologies world and wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. Over her two decades at Parkland, Sara has been a member of the Professional Development Committee for Staff, served several terms as a PSS union representative, and is currently on the PCA Support Assessment Committee.
Outside of work, Sara loves spending time with her dog, playing Scrabble, making soap, gardening, going on road trips, and creating all sorts of things.
2023 Staff Green Award Winner
HeatherAnn Layman
HeatherAnn is the Operations Assistant for the Planetarium and
Theatre. She is involved with the scholarship review committee, IDEAS
committee, and Entertainment Technology Committee for the Entertainment
Technology Program in AMSS.Her colleagues say that “she embodies all the
qualities that make a great Parkland employee that also help transcend
to help make Parkland a wonderful place."