Early Career Achievement Awards 2022 - 2023 Award Recipients

Jhoanna Astudillo '07

Marketing, International Business

Jhoanna Astudillo emigrated from Ecuador to the US in 1999 and she remembers feeling like she was on “mute” for the first year due to her lack of language skills.  She joined the US Army in Sept 99 and was a sergeant and logistic specialist.  She served with distinction in Iraq retiring in 2003.

In 2007, Jhoanna joined Chase and served in different roles:  from Personal Banker to Manager, Wholesaler and Senior Wholesaler. She received a National Achiever award in 2010 and 2012 for being a top performer. She also served as the Regional Diversity Council Leader designing and executing initiatives for Oklahoma, Texas and Louisiana.

In 2015, she received the 40 under 40 award in OKC for my work in diversity efforts. 

Jhoanna joined BOK in 2017 and served in multiple positions. Currently, she is a VP, Monetary Operations Manager. Her role is to provide monetary risk management to improve the operating health of the Consumer Bank. She also serves on the National Diversity Council, a co-Leader of the Practicing Inclusion group and an active participant in volunteer events. 

Jhoanna's husband, Christopher Story, is also in Finance and they have a daughter, Emilia Cristina. 

She currently serves on the board for UMA Tulsa and is an active volunteer in the community.

Richard "RJ" Barnes '14

Marketing

After graduating Illinois State University, RJ earned a role at Progressive Impressions International in Bloomington, managing direct mail marketing for State Farm Insurance. This experience expanded his interest in marketing, gaining him greater skills that lead to his current role at Discover Financial Services in Riverwoods, IL. At Discover Financial Services, he is a Principal Portfolio Marketing Manager, responsible for planning, coordinating, and executing  digital marketing campaigns across multiple channels, in order to provide new cardmembers with the best onboarding experience possible.

He continues to sharpen his marketing expertise, and build his leadership skills with the goal of being a People Leader.  

Out of work, RJ is the founder of Creative Eye Multimedia, an agency  that supports small businesses grow their unique brands. He is also the founder  and host of Late Night Lake Show Podcast. RJ enjoys playing basketball and  spending time with his wife, Ashley, and their two kids, Greyson and Gianna.

Jerrod Campbell '14, M.S. '16

Marketing - Integrated Marketing Communications

Jerrod is a two-time graduate of Illinois State University ( B.S. in Integrated Marketing Communications '14 and M.S. in Sport Management '16). He is entering his second year as an Account Director for Sports Business Journal, overseeing all sponsorship and advertising sales, and working with pro and collegiate sports teams, leagues, and brands across the Midwest.

Jerrod joined SBJ after working for Notre Dame Global Partnerships, the multi-media rights arm of Notre Dame Athletics, where he oversaw the development of a newly created gameday hospitality project for the Irish football program, while also supporting sponsorship efforts for athletics. 

Prior to Notre Dame, he also held multiple roles with his beloved Chicago Cubs and Illinois State Athletics post-graduate studies. Jerrod volunteers in his community as a Big Brother for Big Brothers Big Sisters. He spends his free time with his fiancé, Sarah McDonough, and fellow Redbirds in the Chicagoland area. ROLL BIRDS

Erin Dullard '13

Insurance

Erin Dullard is a Senior Client Manager at Swiss Re based in Bogotá, Colombia responsible for Life and Health Reinsurance business in Colombia, Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador. Her responsibilities include leading a team in new business generation and creation of new products and implementation of digital solutions.

She moved to Miami in 2013 as a Property Treaty Underwriter in the graduates@swissre programme, later joining the L&H team as AVP Client Manager in 2017.

Moving to Bogotá in 2019, she was promoted to Vice President, then to Senior Client Manager in 2020. Erin is responsible for Swiss Re’s L&H Sustainability Initiative for Latin America. 

Erin is a Class of ‘13 Illinois State grad with a double major in Insurance and Finance with a Minor in Spanish. She holds CPCU and ARe designations, and was  named a 2021 Rising Star by Insurance Business Americas.

In her free time, she spends as much time as possible exploring with her husband and dog.

Jon Goldsher '13

B.S./M.P.A.

Jon is the Chief Financial Officer and Chief Compliance Officer at Boyne Capital, a Florida-based private equity firm, where he oversees various accounting, financial reporting, investor communication, and compliance activities. Boyne is a SEC-Registered Investment Adviser with over $400 million of assets under management, focused on acquisitions of lower middle market companies. 

Prior to joining Boyne Capital, Jon was an Assurance Senior Manager in Ernst & Young’s Chicago office where he led financial statement audits of private equity funds, hedge funds, mutual funds, and investment advisers. He began his career as an auditor at RSM US.

Jon is a CPA in the states of Illinois and Florida.

Jon currently resides in Miami, Florida with his wife Megan (a Registered Nurse and fellow Redbird) and daughter Eliana. They love travel, soaking up the Florida sunshine, playing pickleball, and competing in just about everything.  The couple is expecting a new addition to their family in February.

Chad Halloran '12

B.S./M.P.A.

Chad is a Tax Senior Manager at Deloitte, based in St. Louis. He has spent his entire professional career working in Deloitte’s state and local tax practice, primarily serving large corporate and passthrough entity clients.  During the first four years of his career, Chad largely focused on assisting his corporate and passthrough entity clients with state income tax compliance.

Since 2016, Chad has been an integral member of Deloitte’s State Strategic Tax Review Team, a national team, where his focus has been on state income tax planning involving state income tax refund reviews and legal entity restructuring services.  Chad is a frequent speaker on various corporate state income and franchise tax topics at both internal Deloitte and external tax conferences, including Tax Executives Institute and Council on State Taxation.

Outside of work, Chad is involved in various community service organizations, both locally in Saint Louis and volunteering on international service trips.

Frannie Heine '09

Human Resources and Minor in International Business

Frannie has spent her career at Maui Jim Sunglasses where she’s held various roles across Human Resources, Global Operations, and Supply Chain. Her passion for travel and exploring new cultures has led her to work closely with Maui Jim’s international teams, including a 5-year assignment in Dubai, UAE.

In her current role as Director of Domestic Fulfillment and Global Logistics, Frannie oversees all logistics, warehousing, and fulfillment functions. She leads a team of 70+ individuals to move Maui Jim’s products from our manufacturers to our distribution centers and customers around the world.

Frannie serves as the President of the Board of Directors for ArtsPartners of Central Illinois, where she also sits on the Ignite Peoria Committee.

Additionally, she serves on the Board of Directors for Peoria Grown, a local food insecurity charity. In her spare time, Frannie enjoys participating in book clubs, traveling, and attending community events with her husband and daughter.

Matthew Hornback '05

Business Administration and Entrepreneurship 

Matthew is a Sales & Management leader with 16+ years of building relationships, people, process and business. After earning his bachelor degree in Business Administration and Entrepreneurship from Illinois State University, he began his career in sales and management to explore my passion for leading others and entrepreneurship.

Over his career, he has held sales positions, managed people, built sales teams, and developed ways of working. Today as Director of Sales at ADM, a leading global agribusiness, he manages their sales strategy and team of sales professionals to protect our core book of customers, ensure innovative growth, and develop talent through coaching & mentoring.

In addition, he helps manage their sales career continuum, talent pipeline, their technology implementation strategy, and acts as a key liaison to the Illinois State College of Business.

Matthew also serves on the board of directors for a local educational foundation (Argenta-Oreana EF) and as President of a local philanthropic and social organization.

Tyler Kirby '07

Marketing, Business Administration

Entering his 14th season with the Kansas City Chiefs, Tyler Kirby was originally hired as a Ticket Sales Representative in 2009 and rose through the ranks of the clubs business operations team. He was recently named Executive Vice President of Business Development in May of 2022.

Kirby oversees all aspects of the teams ticket sales and operations, including consumer marketing efforts, and the club’s client services and premium sales departments. Kirby has been integral in launching innovative ticketing initiatives at Arrowhead Stadium as well as strengthening the club’s digital marketing efforts, using data and technology to transform the way the club connects with individuals, markets to fans, and grows the fanbase.

Prior to joining the Chiefs, Kirby served as the Marketing Coordinator at U.S. Cellular Coliseum in Bloomington and worked for the Illlinois State University Athletic Dept. He received his bachelors degree in marketing and business administration from ISU in 2007 and MBA from UMKC in 2011.

Kevin Martin '09

Business Education

After graduation, Dr. Kevin M. Martin showed his teaching career with Teach For America - St. Louis at the historic Charles E. Sumner High School in St. Louis. During his time here, he taught business, special education, and mathematics.

Since graduating from Illinois State in ‘05 with a Bachelors in Business Teacher Education, he has earned several degrees, a Doctorate of Education, Educational Specialists, a Masters of Education all in Educational Leadership, and Graduate Certificate in Human Resources Management.

Martin has moved up the career ladder in the education field from a teacher to department leader to instructional and data coach to an assistant principal to his current role as principal in the Parkway School District in Missouri. Further, he is involved in the community and serves as an elected official on the local Community College Board of Trustees, and his local school district Board of Education. Martin serves as the Board Chair and Board Secretary respectively.

Warren McCarty '09

Business Administration

Warren McCarty is a trial lawyer focusing on technology-related litigation in federal courts. He specializes in Intellectual Property law involving patents and copyrights. Warren recently became the youngest partner at the boutique trial law firm Caldwell Cassady & Curry. His firm has tried and won some of the biggest IP verdicts in the past decade against the largest companies in the world.

Warren’s representations span across the globe, from companies in Chicago and Nevada, to London and China. In his cases, he has appeared before federal district judges and juries in jurisdictions like Arizona, California, Texas, New York, and Washington, D.C.

At Illinois State, Warren was a wide receiver on the ISU football team and a 4.0 student in the College of Business. After ISU Warren attended the University of Virginia School of Law, ranked the #8 law school in the nation.

Today, he lives in Dallas with his wife Haley, and their three children Maeve, Maren, and Mickey.

Renee Nelson '13

 Marketing - Integrated Marketing Communications

Renee Nelson is the Director of Marketing Operations for Americaneagle.com, a global digital agency, where she leads and oversees the brand awareness and lead generation efforts for the organization.

Renee is a high performing, strategic, and hyper-organized professional with 9+ years of marketing experience and proven success in strategic marketing, campaign development, event planning, and project management.

Renee started her career as a Media Strategist, working on the HP Enterprise Business account. Moving from a media buying role to Partnership Marketing Manager at Americaneagle.com in 2014, she was responsible for the execution of joint campaigns alongside a network of partners to drive growth. In 2018, Renee was promoted to Director of Marketing Operations, where she oversees a growing team of 14. She is an active leader who brings insights and creativity into each project she works on.

Ben Owen '15

Business Education

After obtaining his MBA, Ben began his career working in professional Business roles for 4 years. After having an opportunity to work with students in local schools, Ben decided to return to college to obtain his teaching degree. Ben is now in his 8th year of education.

He has worked as a high school business teacher, MTSS coordinator, school administrator, and has recently transitioned to his new role as a Career and Technical Education Educator at NIU. In this role, Ben is working on the NIU Illinois CTE Project with the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE).

Ben works with high schools across the state, supports implementation of career pathways, develops and delivers administrator academies, and works alongside an ISBE team to meet CTE goals. Ben also finds it very important to support as-piring professionals and give back to his profession.

He has acted as a mentor for new teachers, served on the Business Education Advisory Committee at Illinois State, spoke with classes about edTPA, and co-authored a chapter for the NBEA yearbook. 

Luke Peifer '13

Accounting

Luke Peifer is a Senior Manager in Miller Cooper’s Transaction and Advisory Services group and a member of the firm’s Assurance and Accounting Department. He is responsible for overseeing the day to day work on buy-side and sell-side agreed-upon procedure and financial due diligence engagements with clients in a variety of industries.

Luke has seven years of public accounting experience and has serviced clients in a variety of industries with significant experience performing financial diligence for financial service clients, distribution, manufacturing and construction companies.

Outside of public accounting, he has two years of private experience with an insurance broker. Mr. Peifer earned a Bachelor of Finance, and a Bachelor of Accounting from Illinois State University.

He is a member of the Illinois CPA Society as well as a member of the Board of Directors and Treasurer of the Bloomington Normal Baseball Association.

Riley Phipps '18

Business Information Systems

Riley Phipps has been at iManage for 4 years now. Her current role at iManage is Lead Support Engi-neer on their Cloud Advisory team. Her duties includes leading a team of Support Engineers, managing enterprise customer issues during implementation, making data driven decisions that lead to process changes, and educating the field on the latest best practices

In 2021, she received the iManage Employee of the Year award, an award voted on by peers for individuals who embrace learning and change and have a significant impact on their customers.

She currently lives in Chicago and loves it. Over the past few years, Riley has been an active member of Team Bright Side which is an organization that raises money to help eradicate Pediatric Cancer while training for the Chicago Triathlon. She is an assistant softball coach for the 12u Elite Fastpitch soft-ball team based in Chicago.

Riley appreciates the opportunity to speak to BIS students in Rosie Hauck’s classes from time to time.

JD Schurter '11, MBA '17

Finance, Accounting, MBA (CMBA Program)

JD presently works at Wells Fargo as the Head of Cash IPV in Charlotte, North Carolina where he supervises an international team of 25 in the price validation of over $550B of cash securities. He previously held roles as Co-Head of Cash IPV and High Yield Credit Trader at Wells Fargo.

He previously held roles as Co-Head of Cash IPV and High Yield Credit Trader at Wells Fargo. Prior to his career at Wells Fargo, he worked for CLA in central Illinois as a CPA.

He is a veteran of the United States Navy, having served on active duty from 2003-2007 and in the Naval Reserve from 2007-2012.

JD is presently serving on the Board of Directors for the ISU Alumni Association and the Board of Trustees for the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra.

JD graduated from Illinois State in 2011 with B.S. degrees in Finance and Accounting, and again in 2017 with an MBA. He also recently graduated from Georgetown University with an MS Finance. He is licensed as a CPA in both Illinois and North Carolina, and holds several FINRA securities licenses

Jonathan Strok '11

Finance, Financial Accounting

Jonathan Strok grew up in Palatine, Illinois and graduated from Illinois State University in 2011 with a B.S. in Finance and Accounting.

Jonathan returned home to start his career at Northern Trust in Chicago as a fund accountant but returned to Bloomington-Normal in early 2013 to rejoin COUNTRY Financial as a bank compliance analyst where he previously interned. He joined the wealth management team in 2015, becoming an investment analyst and a Portfolio Manager in 2019.

Jonathan was awarded right to use the Chartered Financial Analyst® designation in October 2015.

As a portfolio manager, Jonathan is a voting member of COUNTRY Trust Bank’s invest committees, performs research duties, and manages high-net-worth client portfolios. He had the opportunity to speak at the Exchange ETF Conference in May 2022. He is a member of the ISU EFIF Panel of Professionals and presents to the FIL 346 class annually.

Jonathan lives in Normal with his girlfriend Cristie and enjoys golfing and cooking.