RIC Alumni Dominate PBN’s 40 Under Forty 2023 Awards

Each year, Providence Business News honors 40 Rhode Island professionals under the age of 40 with the 40 Under Forty Award for their career achievements and involvement within their communities.

Inevitably, each year, RIC alumni make the list. This year, they dominated the list. This year’s winners are Stacey Aguiar ’12, Luca Carnevale ’11, Morgan Jones Champlin ’08, Kimberly (Brown) Mittelsteadt ’16, Stefan Petrella ’11 and Brooke (Souza) Tremblay ’07.

Stacey Aguiar ’12

Stacey Aguiar is senior director of clinical quality at UnitedHealthcare and an adjunct instructor of health care administration at Rhode Island College. She has over 18 years of diversified experience and skill sets in continuous quality improvement and data analysis, as well as eight years in education. Aguiar earned her B.S. in health education, with a community health concentration, from RIC in 2012.

After graduating from RIC, Aguiar became an early childhood project and quality improvement manager for the Rhode Island Department of Health as well as an Act Early Ambassador for Rhode Island at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. She went on to become a quality consultant at Neighborhood Health Plan of Rhode Island, before taking on her current position at UnitedHealthcare, where she has worked since 2019.

As senior director of clinical quality at UnitedHealthcare, Aguiar oversees all quality improvement initiatives. As an adjunct faculty member at Rhode Island College, she teaches performance improvement in health care in the Health Care Administration Program. Her passion for teaching began during her time as a RIC undergraduate. Since then, she has mentored and provided internships for students and provided support for faculty as a guest speaker and instructor of classes on such topics as résumé building and career development. Aguiar is a recipient of the 2021 Feinstein School of Education Alumni Award.

Luca Carnevale ’11

Luca Carnevale is executive director of operations for Hope & Main, a nonprofit business incubation organization that gives food and beverage businesses a low-risk opportunity to test, scale and develop their products without the cost and liability in equipping, managing and maintaining their own commercial culinary facility. Carnevale, who joined Hope & Main in its infancy, demonstrates outstanding leadership in this complex operation. His oversight and management of the facility and its growing team has led to expansive growth while driving innovation. Carnevale brings extensive technical knowledge of food processing and procedures, financial management and business expertise. Hence, he is a critical resource for onboarding new food businesses and memberships. As a Leadership Rhode Island graduate, Carnevale continually seeks opportunities for professional growth and connections. He is board chair of the Rhode Island Food Dealers Association, helping to provide a unified voice for food businesses statewide and nationally. Carnevale earned his B.S. in marketing in 2011.

Morgan Jones Champlin ’08

Morgan Jones Champlin has 13 years of varied experience working for General Dynamics, a global aerospace and defense company. She was first employed at General Dynamics Information Technology, Inc. and is now at General Dynamics Electric Boat, which designs, constructs and provides the lifecycle support of nuclear submarines for the U.S. Navy. 

As a human resource information systems (HRIS) lead, Champlin supports critical HRIS processes and business operations. Her oversight of data quality, governance and operational excellence enables key business analytics, metrics, policy and data security. For her exemplary performance and contributions to Electric Boat, Champlin has received three presidential operational excellence awards since 2017.

One of her proudest accomplishments, however, is the establishment of an employee resource group at Electric Boat for women and allies, called ForWARD: For Women’s Advancement, Recognition & Development. The group’s goals are to promote, support and evolve women employees with personal and professional development opportunities, local community service and enrichment endeavors, along with growing a rich networking circle. 

For Champlin, uplifting the lives of women extends to numerous volunteer efforts outside the job. She gives time and love to such causes as Safe Futures, the WARM Center, Moms Demand Action, the Tim West Memorial Scholarship Fund, Opening Doors for Children, Girl Scouts of Rhode Island and Southeastern New England, Westerly Public Schools and other Electric Boat-partner schools, and various natural disaster relief efforts. Champlin earned her B.A. in English at Rhode Island College in 2008 and is a proud wife and mother of two amazing children.

Kimberly (Brown) Mittelsteadt ’16

Kimberly (Brown) Mittelsteadt who earned her B.A. in psychology at Rhode Island College in 2016, is director of human resources at University Orthopedics, an organization with over 60 physicians, more than 700 employees and 14 locations throughout Rhode Island and Massachusetts.

Mittelsteadt partners with her company’s senior leadership to plan, design, develop, implement and evaluate all human resources-related activities and initiatives to support the company’s strategic goals. She brings 16 years of human resources experience, including employee recruitment, retention, employee relations, staff development, conflict resolution, compensation, records management, policy development, legal compliance and talent management systems. Her company was awarded one of the Best Places to Work RI by PBN for two years in a row (2022 and 2023).

Mittelsteadt also serves as a committee member of The OrthoForum – a national physician specialty organization whose membership includes many of the largest privately owned orthopedic practices in the United States. She established and co-chairs two committees within University Orthopedics – the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee and the Charitable Giving Committee. She also successfully mentored several Bryant University human resources and business interns, who have since been placed in professional workplace roles.

Throughout the years, Mittelsteadt has received numerous accolades, including the Bryant University Internship Excellence Award for her work in hiring, training, developing and coaching business interns for University Orthopedics. When she isn’t working, Mittelsteadt enjoys traveling with her husband and daughter and cheering on her two nephews at soccer/basketball games.

Stefan Petrella ’11

Stefan Petrella is senior vice president and director of marketing and business development for Starkweather and Shepley Insurance Brokerage, Inc., a company which was one of the winners of PBN’s 2023 Leaders & Achievers Awards. Petrella is also the firm’s entertainment and theatre practice group leader. He brought the firm to national prominence through the development of a theatre-specific risk management program, and his clients include the Providence Performing Arts Center and the Trinity Repertory Company.

An advocate of the arts, Petrella works with inner-city schools to help bring theatre and the performing arts to youth. He also serves on the advisory board of Lady Gaga’s Born This Way Foundation in support of the equity, diversity and inclusion of youth in the arts. His extensive volunteerism includes service on United Way of Rhode Island’s Young Leader’s Circle, marketing consultant for Forbes Communications Council and executive board member of Progreso Latino, Inc.

In 2020 Petrella was awarded Starkweather’s Service Award, which honors an associate who goes above and beyond in the community and assists and leads fellow associates within the company. Petrella earned his B.A. in public relations and applied communication at Rhode Island College in 2011 and his B.A. in marketing/digital interactive media at Seton Hall University in 2008.

Brooke (Souza) Tremblay ’07

Brooke (Souza) Tremblay is group account director at TribalVision, a digital marketing agency offering a suite of outsourced marketing services. A self-starter with an entrepreneurial spirit, Tremblay quickly rose up the firm’s ranks ‒ holding five positions in just 10 years – and is the only director on the Executive Leadership Team in the firm’s history. She is a growth-minded marketer, driving results by leading teams to develop strategic, omni-channel campaigns.

Her many professional accomplishments include helping 18 Rhode Island-based organizations reach their goals as well as regularly volunteering her time and marketing expertise to two Warwick nonprofits – the Boys & Girls Clubs of Warwick and SouthPointe Christian Church. Tremblay earned her B.A. in English, with a minor in writing, at Rhode Island College in 2007 and her M.B.A. in global business leadership, with a marketing concentration, at Johnson & Wales University in 2010.

Rhode Island College honors all six of these alumni for their distinguished achievements in their field and for demonstrating the value of a RIC degree through their achievements. PBN will hold a formal 40 Under Forty recognition ceremony on Thursday, July 20, at 5:30 p.m. at the Aldrich Mansion in Warwick. Also, a special section highlighting each honoree will be featured in the July 21-Aug. 3 print and digital editions of PBN.