Patricia Duggan Court Administrator  Supreme Court of SD Pierre, South Dakota

The Star Award is conferred on an ICM Fellow who demonstrates excellence in the advancement of court administration through leadership and education. Once each year, ICM notifies Fellows of the Institute for Court Management that it is accepting nominations of ICM Fellows to be considered for the Star Award. After a review of the nominations, the Vice President of ICM selects the winner and announces the Star Award winner at a Fellows reception typically held at the annual conference of the National Association for Court Management.

The recipient of the 2011 Star Award is Patricia Duggan from South Dakota. Pat assumed her role as State Court Administrator in 2008 after serving the South Dakota trial courts for eight years, the Minnesota trial courts for five years, and the New Mexico AOC for five years before that.  She has consistently demonstrated her passion for continuous learning and education in the court community. Having a B.S. degree in organizational leadership and an M.S. degree in management, she sought to become an ICM Fellow and graduated with the ICM Fellows class of 2004.

In her role as State Court Administrator, she supports a continuing partnership with State Court Administrator Sally Holewa of North Dakota to enable court administrative staff from both states to obtain their Court Manager certification from ICM. Pat's Fellows research paper was on the subject of succession planning, and as a result of that paper, she actively collaborated with the National Association for Court Management (NACM) as chair of the workgroup that authored the Mini Guide on Succession Planning. Pat has been a conference presenter on this issue as well.

As State Court Administrator, she continues to concentrate heavily on leadership, mentoring, training, and staff development on all levels, encouraging court employees to advance their careers in many different ways.

Congratulations to Ms. Duggan, ICM’s winner of the 2011 Star Award.

“Thank you for this award. I've long been a believer of the
John Maxwell credo: leadership is not learned in a day, it's
done day by day. I owe this award to the many people
over the years who have supported my own personal and
professional development, those who have modeled the
way yet let me walk my own path, and those who have
let me share my passion for learning in so many ways.
This award represents a continuing responsibility to
promote the advancement of the judicial system through
the people who tend to it every day. I am proud to do so."

Previous Star Award Winners
2010 Don Jacobson
2009 Bob Zastany
2008 Chris Crawford
2007 Collins E. Ijoma
2006 Pamela Ryder-Lahey
2005 D. J. Hanson
2004 Sue Dosal and Gordy Griller
2003 Donald Cullen
2002 Janet G. Cornell
2001 Carl Baar and Geoff Gallas
2000 Mary M. Brittain
1999 Daniel H. Straub