Business Travel Professional Development Graduates Honored at NBTA Convention

NBTA and the NBTA Foundation offer three levels of professional development designed to move business travel professionals through the entire span of their careers:

Fundamentals of Business Travel Management/CTE
Certified Corporate Travel Executive (CCTE)
Global Leadership Professional (GLP)

The Fundamentals of Business Travel Management course and Corporate Travel Expert (CTE) designation are the only introductory course and designation for corporate travel professionals. More than 400 people have taken the course to date, and they were recognized in today's General Session at the NBTA Convention.

The Certified Corporate Travel Executive (CCTE) is the recognized certification course for corporate travel professionals; designed for professionals with at least two years of experience in the business travel field. The CCTE program is offered through a partnership between NBTA and the University of Houston Conrad Hilton College of Hotel & Restaurant Management. NBTA today graduated 65 new CCTEs:

Kelly Babbs, Ricoh Electronics, Inc.
Sarah Best, Loews Hotels
Belinda Borden, The University of California at Los Angele
Rose Burkhalter Hess, Corporation
Jorge Caamano, NBTA
Gaby Clifton, Republic Financial Corporation
John Clifton, Kellogg Brown & Root, Inc.
Cathy Cottrell, Columbian Chemicals Company
Fred Dallenbach, Carlson Wagonlit Travel
Misti Daniel, Devon Energy Corporation
Donna Denton, Nabors Industries Ltd.
Everette Fernandes, Runzheimer International
Beverly Finkey, BCD Travel
Wanda Foster, CSX Transportation, Inc.
Melissa Fusco, Great-West Life
Daniel Garuti, Loomis Sayles & Co., L.P.
Chester Gladue, Amadeus
Sandra Golden, Golden Opportunities
Jill Goldner, Skechers USA
Kathleen Goodliffe, Intermountain Health Care
DJ Greenagel, Carlson Wagonlit Travel
Bill Griesser, Frontier Airlines
Wafa Haleem, Boston Coach
Cyndy Hayes, Move, Inc.
Alex Henriquez
Laura Herde, Continental Airlines
Bobby Hobes, Constella Group
Joyce Hofmann, Textron, Inc.
Erin Jamgochian, Edwards Lifesciences
John Janco, Holiday Inn West - Kalamazoo
Trish Johnson, William Blair & Company, LLC
Afi Karimi, Akamai Technologies, Inc.
Georgia Karnezis, Accenture
Louise Kendall, ADTRAV Travel Management
Debbie Kilgore, Spirit Aerosystems
Jens Liltorp, Novo Nordisk A/S
Carol Madura, Limited Brands
Amy Marciano-Ratliff, American Express Business Travel
Sherrill McLean, Hilton Dallas Lincoln Centre
Tammy McQurter, Global Industries Offshore, Inc.
Mark Molaison, McDermott International
Faye Neville, McDonald's Corporation
Jeanne Norton, American Express Company
Mary Patterson, Omni Houston Hotel at Westside
Peter Pearson, The Coca-Cola Company
Lourdes Perez, Continental Airlines
Julie Polinsky, RBC Wealth Management
Steve Prats, HelmsBriscoe
Kristen Reeves, Nuance Communications, Inc.
Connie Reilly, SEI Investments
Jan Rochelle, Koch Supply Company, LP
Pat Sage, Huron Consulting Group, LLC
Kathy Schaefer
Jan Shoemaker, Land O'Lakes, Inc.
Kristen Smith, The Boston Beer Company
Vivian Smith, Tower Travel Management
Jaclyn Sobel, Six Flags, Inc.
Greg Steifer, Northwest/KLM Airlines
Darcy Taylor, Kellogg Brown & Root, Inc.
Laura Thompson, SynXis
Denise Truso, Carlson Wagonlit Travel
Gaye Vollrath
Mark Windsor, Occidental Petroleum Corporation
Jackie Woodward, BCD Travel
Monica Young, National Oilwell Varco

NBTA President & CEO, Kevin Maguire, CCTE, GLP, said, "I congratulate these dedicated industry professionals who have made the choice to advance their careers and better position themselves to provide value for their companies by earning the CCTE designation."

The Global Leadership Professional (GLP) program is the business travel industry's premier master's-level education program, offered by the NBTA Foundation in conjunction with The Wharton School of Business. Upon completion of the GLP coursework, participants earn a Certificate of Professional Development from the Wharton School before beginning one-year team projects to earn the GLP designation.

The NBTA Foundation and Wharton today recognized 28 GLP students who earned the Certificate of Professional Development and 24 who earned the GLP designation. This is the first class to earn the GLP designation since it was introduced last year:

Denise Adleman, GLP, Robert Half International
Jane Bankester, GLP, World Vision
Carol Beaulieu, GLP, Biogen Idec
Barbara Campbell, GLP, Dr Pepper Snapple Group
Fred Dallenbach, GLP, Carlson Wagonlit Travel
David DiPietro, GLP, Baxter Healthcare
Don Draves, GLP, Miller Brewing Company
Janie Hansen, GLP, Port of Portland
Tina Itschner, GLP, HNTB Companies
Kevin Iwamoto, GLP, Hewlett-Packard
Donna Kelliher, GLP, Dominion
Carole Liberti, GLP, Information Resources, Inc.
Stacey MacAlister, CCTE, GLP, Global Strategy Consultant
Kevin Maguire, CCTE, GLP, The University of Texas at Austin
Gary Murakami, CCTE, GLP, CTC, The Ritz-Carlton, San Francisco
Gary Polito, CCTE, GLP, Bose Corporation
Lois A. Raffel, CCTE, GLP, AchieveGlobal
Brian Robertson, GLP, CTC, RADIUS Vision 2000 Travel Group
Norma Rohrbach, GLP, Citi
Lisa Stanford, GLP, ConocoPhillips
Scott Sward, GLP, GE Security
Sandy Taylor, GLP, Best Western International
Rosemary Utesch, GLP
Debbie Welder, CCTE, GLP, CHG Healthcare Services, Inc.

NBTA Foundation Chair Fay Beauchine said, "These 24 professionals deserve the greatest praise and warmest congratulations. They have earned the highest-level designation in the corporate travel industry, and at the same time they have pioneered a brand new, world-class professional development program."

About NBTA
The National Business Travel Association (NBTA) is the world's premier business travel and corporate meetings organization. NBTA and its regional affiliates – NBTA Asia Pacific, NBTA Canada, NBTA Mexico and NBTA USA – serve a network of more than 15,000 business travel professionals around the globe with industry-leading events, networking, education & professional development, research, news & information, and advocacy. NBTA members, numbering more than 4,000 in 30 nations, are corporate and government travel and meetings managers, as well as travel service providers. They collectively manage and direct more than US$200 billion of global business travel and meetings expenditures annually on behalf of more than 10 million business travelers within their organizations. For more information, visit www.nbta.org.

About NBTA Foundation
The NBTA Foundation is the education and research foundation of the National Business Travel Association (NBTA). The foundation was established in 1997 to support NBTA's members and the industry as a whole. As the leading education and research foundation in the business travel industry, the NBTA Foundation seeks to fund initiatives to advance the business travel profession. The foundation offers the only master's-level accredited course and professional designation for the corporate travel professional, the Global Leadership Professional (GLP) program, in partnership with The Wharton School. The industry's leading benchmarking resource – the Managed Travel Index® (MTI) & Benchmarking Tool – is offered by the foundation. The NBTA Foundation is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. For more information, see www.nbtafoundation.org.

About the NBTA Convention
Widely recognized as the must-attend event for business travel buyers, suppliers, industry leaders and business travel journalists, the 2008 NBTA International Convention & Exposition will be held in Los Angeles from July 27-30. More than 6,000 travel professionals are expected to take advantage of the convention's programming, designed to empower attendees to maximize value for their companies, including more than 40 seminars on the most important topics in business travel, more than 460 companies exhibiting in the Expo and countless opportunities for networking with peers. For details, visit www.nbtaconvention.org.