Alumni win achievement awards

The College of Sciences has chosen two outstanding alumni to receive the UCF Alumni Professional Achievement Award and the Rising Star Award. This is quite an honor and they will be recognized at the Black and Golf gala on October 29th at UCF Arena, which is part of Homecoming festivities.

Yvette Kanouff, a Mathematics graduate, will receive the Professional Achievement Award and Erin Saitta, a Chemistry graduate, will receive the Rising Star Award.

The Professional Achievement Award is given to a alumnae or alumnus who has reached for the stars in their field for the Professional Achievement Award. The nominee must be a former student who has successfully completed at least two semesters of course work at the University of Central Florida. Preference should be given to alumni who have direct and meaningful involvement with the university. Kanouff is t

he President of SeaChange International, the world’s leading on-demand software/product company. She joined SeaChange when it was a hardware-centric advertising company then led the video on demand product line creation. Kanouff drove the strategic transitioning of SeaChange from a hardware company to a software company and as a result SeaChange is now ranked 168 in Software Magazines “Software 500”.

The Rising Star Award recognizes recent UCF alumni who display promise and excellence in their career. Including these recipients in the Black & Gold Gala offers a glimpse of future recognition they can strive for from their college. Saitta earned her undergraduate and graduate degrees from UCF and has had more than 15 presentations and publications. Her most recent work involves developing and implementing a workshop series for first year graduate teaching assistants in chemistry to improve understanding in chemistry education and teaching techniques.