{"id":6351,"date":"2026-08-11T17:10:24","date_gmt":"2026-08-11T17:10:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/gear-up\/?p=6351"},"modified":"2026-08-12T22:48:00","modified_gmt":"2026-08-12T22:48:00","slug":"arizona-gear-ups-andrea-gonzalez-sotelo-receives-national-professional-leader-of-the-year-award","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/gear-up\/arizona-gear-ups-andrea-gonzalez-sotelo-receives-national-professional-leader-of-the-year-award\/","title":{"rendered":"Arizona GEAR UP’s Andrea Gonz\u00e1lez Sotelo Receives National Professional Leader of the Year Award"},"content":{"rendered":"

Arizona GEAR UP Assistant Director Andrea Gonz\u00e1lez Sotelo<\/strong> was recognized as one of two recipients of the 2026 NCCEP\/GEAR UP Professional Leader of the Year Award during the NCCEP\/GEAR UP Annual Conference held in Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n

The Professional Leader of the Year Award<\/a> recognizes GEAR UP professionals who go above and beyond to make an extraordinary impact on students, communities, and the mission of GEAR UP. Andrea was nominated by Arizona GEAR UP Director Robert Neese<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n

\n
\n “The reason I nominated Andrea for the Leadership Award is because of her exceptional leadership, unwavering commitment to student success, and outstanding contributions to Arizona GEAR UP. Through her strategic oversight of program implementation, evaluation, and grant management, she has strengthened college access and postsecondary success for thousands of students while ensuring the program consistently exceeds performance expectations. Andrea’s innovative, data-driven approach, ability to build strong partnerships, and willingness to step into multiple leadership roles during significant staffing challenges demonstrate her dedication, resilience, and lasting impact on GEAR UP and the students and communities it serves.” – Robert Neese<\/span>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

Andrea has dedicated more than 17 years to helping students and families access higher education. She has served as Assistant Director of Arizona GEAR UP since 2019 after previously serving as a Program Manager and GEAR UP Site Coordinator. As a bilingual, first-generation college graduate, she brings both professional expertise and personal experience to her work, helping ensure students across Arizona have the support and opportunities they need to pursue education beyond high school.<\/p>\n

She oversees Arizona GEAR UP’s evaluation and reporting efforts, ensuring accurate data collection, timely federal reporting, and continuous program improvement. Her work has helped the program meet and exceed grant goals, strengthen partnerships with schools across the state, and use data to improve college access and student success.<\/p>\n

Over the past year, Andrea also guided the program through staffing transitions, stepping into key leadership and management roles to ensure students, schools, and partners continued receiving uninterrupted support.<\/p>\n\n

\n
\n \u201cEnsuring that students have access to educational opportunities is our responsibility. I know firsthand the transformative power of education. I am honored to contribute to work that helps remove barriers, expand opportunities, and helps students and families pursue their goals. This recognition is meaningful because it reflects the collective impact of students, families, schools, and colleagues I have had the privilege to work alongside.\u201d – Andrea Gonz\u00e1lez Sotelo<\/span>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n

This national recognition reflects Andrea’s dedication to expanding educational opportunities for Arizona students and highlights the impact of Arizona GEAR UP’s work to prepare students for success beyond high school.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Arizona GEAR UP Assistant Director Andrea Gonz\u00e1lez Sotelo was recognized as one of two recipients of the 2026 NCCEP\/GEAR UP Professional Leader of the Year Award during the NCCEP\/GEAR UP Annual Conference held in Washington, D.C. The Professional Leader of the Year Award recognizes GEAR UP professionals who go above and beyond to make an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":555,"featured_media":6359,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_oasis_is_in_workflow":0,"_oasis_original":0,"_oasis_task_priority":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[220,207,94],"class_list":["post-6351","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","tag-leadership-award","tag-national","tag-nccep"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/gear-up\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6351","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/gear-up\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/gear-up\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/gear-up\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/555"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/gear-up\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6351"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/gear-up\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6351\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6360,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/gear-up\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6351\/revisions\/6360"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/gear-up\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6359"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/gear-up\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6351"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/gear-up\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6351"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/gear-up\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6351"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}