Audrey Heimler Special Project Award

Audrey Heimler Special Projects Award

The Audrey Heimler Special Project Award (AHSPA) provides an annual award of $10,000 to one or more genetic counselors for a project that focuses on the future of the genetic counseling profession and/or the provision of genetic services. Past projects have included resources for genetic counselors to use with patients, research to help advance the profession and innovative continuing education resources for genetic counselors in current practice.

2025 Applications

Applications are now being accepted for the 2025 Audrey Heimler Special Project Award. Applications are due by Friday, May 23, 2025. Apply Now

About Audrey Heimler

Audrey has had a long and distinguished history of leadership in NSGC and in the genetic counseling profession. Audrey graduated in 1971 from Sarah Lawrence College, the first genetic counseling graduate program in the United States. She went on to help establish the National Society of Genetic Counselors, serving as a member of the founding Board and being elected as NSGC’s first president. Audrey’s pivotal role in NSGC continued over many years. In 1989, a donation to NSGC established the Audrey Heimler Special Project Award (AHSPA) in her honor, in recognition of Audrey's leading role in promoting the profession of genetic counseling and in establishing NSGC as the professional organization for genetic counselors. Audrey was awarded NSGC’s highest professional honor, the Natalie Weissberger Paul National Achievement Award in 1998, and was instrumental in establishing the Jane Engelberg Memorial Fellowship (JEMF).

Early on, Audrey set standards for the practice of genetic counseling, she trained and served as a role model for the next generation of counselors, advocating for the integration of genetics into healthcare. Audrey contributed to the genetic counseling literature, authoring many publications on Huntington disease, various psychosocial aspects of genetic counseling. In 1991, one of these publications identified a syndrome later named Heimler syndrome in recognition of her discovery.

In May 2019, Audrey Heimler was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Public Health degree by the University of South Florida.

2025 AHSPA Committee

Kyle Davis, Chair
Michelle Jacobs, Vice Chair
Dawn Laney, Immediate Past Chair
Rachel Mills, Board Liaison
Andrea Sellers
Shannon Terek
Juliann McConnell
Kathryn Leal

Donations

If you are interested in making a charitable donation to the AHSPA, visit our donation page for more information. To donate by mail with a check, please download and complete a donation form. Your donation will provide support for innovative projects that advance the genetic counseling profession.

Previous AHSPA Full Recipients

Awards are listed by the year in which they were initially funded. Proposals are submitted and reviewed, with the winners announced annually. The official award start date is January 1st of the following year.

2023

Cindy Chin, BSc; Lisa Karger, MS, CGC; Emily Soper, MS, CGC for their project "Gallery Walk: A culturally tailored novel educational tool for increasing awareness of genetic counseling, genetic testing and hereditary breast and ovarian cancer (HBOC) susceptibility in the Black population."

2022

Priyanka Ahimaz, MS, CGC; Carli Andrews, MS, CGC; Jessica L. Giordano, MS, CGC for their project "Development of Patient-Driven Guidelines on Collecting Race, Ethnicity, and Ancestry Information During Pedigree Construction."

2021

Lauren Lichten, MS, CGC for her project "Best Practices Guide for Supervision of Telemedicine Clinical Rotations."

Annie Bao, MS, LMFT; Amanda Bergner, MS, LCGC; Gayun Chan-Smutko, MS, CGC; Janelle Villiers, MS, CGC for their project Intra-Professional Antiracism Dialogue & Discourse Series (IPADDS).

2020

Lila Aiyar, MSc, CGC, CCGC; Tala Berro, MS, CGC; Nadine N. Channaoui, MS, LCGC; Michelle Takemoto, MS, CGC for their project "Development of Outcome Evaluation Framework for Diversity-Related Projects in Genetic Counseling."

2019

Angela Krutish, MSc; Jessica Hartley, MS, CGC for their projects:

2018

Andrea Durst, MS, DrPH, LCGC; Kunal Sanghavi, MBBS, MS, LCGC; Rebecca Vanderwall, MS, MPH, LCGC; Raluca Kurz, MS, LCGC for their project Genetic Counseling in the Genomic Era.

2017

Carrie Atzinger, MS, LGC; and Katie Wusik, LGC for their project Supervision Models in Current Genetic Counseling Supervision Practice.

2016

Priscila Delgado Hodges for her project Development of Spanish Genetic Counseling Lexicon. Also see Lexigene®, a trilingual online lexicon for genetic counseling.

2014

Kara Anstett, BSc and Sharon Chen, BA for their project "Development of a Website to Facilitate the Recruitment of African Americans and Latinos into the field of Genetic Counseling." Project Proposal

Beth Crawford, MS, CGC; Linda Robinson, MS, CGC; Sara Pirzadeh-Miller, MS, CGC for their project Genetic Counseling Assistants: An Integral Piece of the Evolving Genetic Counseling Service Delivery Model.

2013

Heather Zierhut, Stephanie Cohen for their project "Identification of Patient-Centered Outcome Measures in Genetic Counseling." Full Report

2012

Heidi Cope for her project "The psychological impact of pregnancy loss due to prenatally diagnosed lethal fetal conditions."

2011

Sara Riordan and Shannon Kieran for their project "Expanding the Practice of Genomic Counseling in Personalized Medicine: Tools for Genetic Counselors." Visual Aid

2010

Kathleen Valverde for her project "Will Employers Hire Genetic Counselors with a Clinical Doctorate?"

2007

Catherine Reiser for "Development of a Training Program for Clinical Supervisors of Genetic Counseling Students Using the Standardized Student Method."

2005

Robin Bennett and Joseph D. McInerney for "Development of a PowerPoint Slide Set on Family History" and "The Path to Leadership: Strategy to Enhance Student Experience and Member Participation in NSGC."

2004

Logan Karns, Myra Roche, and Beverly Yashar for "Development of 2nd edition, Ethics in Genetic Counseling: an ethics casebook for genetic counselors."

2003

Sumedha Ghate, Cindy Hoyle Solomon, Anna Leininger, Nicole Teed, Jill Brensinger Trimbath for "Child’s Guide to Familial Adenomatous Polyposis (FAP)."

2002

Beth Billings, Sara Goldman, and Vicki Venne for "Genetic Counselor Licensure: Experiences and Opportunities."

2001

Barbara Lerner for "Current Issues in Genetic Counseling: Interactive Internet-Based Counseling."

2000

Robin Bennett for "Recommendations for Genetic Counseling and Screening of Consanguineous Couples and Their Offspring."

1999

Julia Habecker-Green for "Study of Attitudes toward Diagnosis in Pediatric Genetic Counseling."

1998

Ellen Matloff for "The Impact of Cancer Genetic Counseling on Providers."

1997

Jennifer Fitzpatrick and Marlene Huggins for "Duty to Recontact: A Survey of the Attitudes of Genetics Service Providers."

1996

Jamie Israel for "An Introduction to Deafness: A Manual for Genetic Counselors."

1995

Diane Baker for "Guidelines for Patient Letter Writing for Genetic Counseling Students."

1994

Kathy Delp and Molly Minnick for "Manual for Conducting Support Groups for Parents Who Have Chosen to Interrupt Pregnancies Due to Fetal Anomalies."

1993

Vivian Wang for her project on cross-cultural genetic counseling training tools. Included a handbook, case vignettes, roleplaying exercises, and audiovisual resources used in training programs.