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Director-At-Large
Board Member - Jody Gill
Director-at-Large

Jody Gill, CSFM
Blue Valley School District, Overland Park, KS

Jody Gill, CSFM has been buliding and maintaining sports fields for over 20 years. For the last 10 years, he has been the Grounds Coordinator for the Blue Valley School District in Overland Park, Kansas. He was a co-founder of the Mo-Kan Chapter of the STMA and is the current President. He has served as a Board member for the Missouri Valley Turfgrass Association and as an Advisory Board Member for the Longview Community College Turf Management Program. His crew earned the STMA Football Field of the Year award in 2004. He has also written numerous articles and presented at regional and national conferences.

Jody has served as the STMA Board Director representing the Schools K-12 membership segment since 2007. He also serves as the STMA Awards Committee Chairman, and the Information Outreach Committee Board Liaison. He has chaired the Website and Technology Committee. In addition to STMA Board service, Jody serves on the SAFE Board of Trustees (The Foundation for Safer Athletic Field Environments), the charitable arm of STMA.

Vision:
The STMA is truly an awesome organization. Just think about the impact that the members of this organization have had on sports all over the world. Our skills, abilities and efforts help teams and individuals win State, National and even World Championships. I would be very honored to serve another term as a member of this Board. We must reach out to the hundreds of non-member K-12 Schools and Junior Colleges through our local Chapters. To do this, we must continue to find new ways to support, strengthen and encourage our local chapters through new member incentive programs and additional incentives to bring in more first time conference attendees. We have so much to offer these organizations, but more importantly, they have knowledge and skills that will make the STMA even better when they become members. I believe this membership category has the greatest potential for growth. The time is now to market and grow the STMA!

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Board Member - John Sorochan, Ph.D.
Director-at-Large

John Sorochan, Ph.D.
University of Tennessee

John Sorochan, Ph.D. , is an Associate Professor in the Department of Plant Sciences for the University of Tennessee, where he is responsible for turfgrass research and teaching. He serves on the STMA Conference Education and Information Outreach Committees and has served on its Scholarship Committee. He is a member of the Tennessee Valley STMA Chapter, has been a member of the STMA since 1995.

John serves on the STMA Information Outreach and the Conference Education Committees and previously served on the Scholarship Committee.

A native of Calgary, Alberta, Canada, John began working on the grounds crew at Earl Grey Golf and Country Club in 1988. He attended Michigan State University (MSU) and graduated from the 2-year Golf Turfgrass Management Program in 1993. John starting working for Dr. John (Trey) Rogers, III and Dr. John Stier (University of Wisconsin) for the Pontiac Silverdome World Cup Soccer Project. Enjoying the sports turf research, he began his Masters of Science research while being duo enrolled as an undergraduate and graduate student in 1995. He graduated with a Masters of Science Degree in Crop and Soil Sciences (MSU) in 1999. During his Masters, John became Dr. Trey Rogers’ Research Technician responsible for all sports turf research being conducted at MSU. In 2007, John won the W.F. & Golda Moss Outstanding Teaching Award for the University of Tennessee College of Ag and Natural Resources, but his proudest accomplishment since being at UT has been the success of his students as STMA scholarship winners and the student challenge trophy in 2007.

Vision:
As an STMA Board Member, I envision my role as continuing the excellent growth of the association and public awareness of the professionalism of the industry. I think it is important for the STMA to be recognized as a major resource for all people involved in the turfgrass industry from sports turf managers to commercial turf professionals to academicians. It would be a goal of mine to have more university academicians and students actively involved with the STMA.
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