Speaking With Recipients of the 2025 AANP State Award for Outstanding Contributions
Two nurse practitioners talk about their path to excellence and plans for the future.
In 1991, the American Association of Nurse Practitioners® (AANP) introduced the State Awards for Excellence to recognize nurse practitioner (NP) achievements across the country. In 2024, this recognition of NP excellence was renamed the AANP State Award for Outstanding Contributions, but the goal remains the same — to honor NPs who have “shown efforts to advance the image, profile and visibility of NPs at the state level.”
Nominations for the state awards are now open. AANP spoke with 2025 State Award recipients Gino Paolucci, DNP, ACNP-BC, ANVP-BC, of Rhode Island, and Nykkia Sellers, DNP, FNP, BC-ADM, CDCES, of Arkansas, about receiving their awards and what they hope to accomplish next. Learn more about these awardees and their contributions, then submit your own nomination or nominate a deserving NP in your community for the award.
Quality Diabetes Care in Rural Arkansas
Speaking about becoming a diabetes expert, Nykkia Sellers is quick to credit her colleagues with encouraging her and recognizing her talents. “I worked at a multi-provider facility,” she recalls. “It was two MDs and three or four NPs. They would say, ‘We’re sending you our patient with diabetes because you’re our diabetes expert.’ And I was like, ‘I am?’ Somebody else really had to tell me, I guess.” After taking what was then called the Certified Diabetes Educator exam (now known as the Certified Diabetes Care and Education Specialist credential), Sellers took a position overseeing diabetes care and wellness prevention. “That’s when my love of diabetes care really began, and I focused on diabetes. And that was 10 years ago,” she says.
Sellers had previously worked in Memphis, Tennessee, but recognized there was a need for NPs of her specialty “across the bridge” in West Memphis, Arkansas. At the time, the area had “no endo providers…no one there specializing in diabetes,” and patients “would have to travel at least an hour or cross the line into Tennessee to see a specialist,” she remembers. Sellers opened her own practice, which came with its own challenges. “I never wanted to be an entrepreneur,” she recalls. “I never desired to open my own practice, but I did.” The learning curve, from Sellers’ telling of it, is more than balanced by the positive reception from patients and her community. “I love when patients — some of which have had diabetes for 20+ years — tell me I’m able to break down what they have, why they have it and why they’re taking medication in a way where they can fully understand it.”
The idea of “bringing people to care,” as she puts it, is exemplified in the Grow Healthy, Live Healthy initiative she spearheaded in West Memphis at a local park. Vendors like dentists, pharmacists and dieticians offered their services free to the public, and a retired foreign service officer gave away resources, tools and knowledge to help individuals start their own home gardens. Plus, there was food: “We had a low-carb food demo so people could learn how to cook healthier,” and a food truck offered “steak kabobs, chicken kabobs and a vegetable medley. Everything was absolutely free to the public,” she says.
Sellers hopes to bring back Grow Healthy, Live Healthy in 2026, but in the meantime, she continues to be active in AANP and other organizations while advocating for sound health care policy. “It’s important for NPs to stay united, stay on the forefront and highlight how well we are doing and how well we do with our patients,” she says. Going forward, she would also like to see “more people in the diabetes field, as far as NPs. I think we need more people who want to be diabetes educators, especially people of color.”
Advocacy and Excellence in Rhode Island
Gino Paolucci began his career as a paramedic in his early twenties but says “I knew I wanted to be a provider. I went on to become an NP and worked in emergency medicine.” Paolucci then worked in an emergency department and was selected to head up a mini stroke unit within that department. “What was unique about my experience is that I had both the pre-hospital and the emergency medicine experience to take care of stroke patients,” he recalls. While working in this position, advancements made within his specialization changed everything for his patients and his profession.
“In 2015, we had a revolution in stroke care, and evidence showed that a new procedure called a mechanical thrombectomy was highly effective in improving both morbidity and mortality of these large vessel occlusion strokes — so the most severe kind of ischemic stroke.” Paolucci’s hospital was able to provide this procedure while other nearby hospitals were not, and his team grew from four to 11. “It has been an incredible journey,” he reflects. “It's amazing to see what great work we do. I will say that 15 years ago, the patients that we treat now…the majority of them would be bedbound in a nursing home, and now they're walking out of the hospital, living full lives.”
In addition to his work at the hospital, Paolucci is also involved in The Rhode Island Stroke Task Force. This is a “group of professionals from all aspects of stroke care,” he explains, and includes representatives from different hospitals. “On this task force, we meet every quarter, and we brainstorm ideas on how we can improve stroke care in the state. We also look at statistics — we look at how we're doing as a state, and we benchmark it to other states, as well as to other hospitals of similar sizes.” COVID-19 slowed the task force’s momentum, but Paolucci says that they’re working to get to where they were before the pandemic: “We’re back on track to do great things again to promote stroke care, and to really help the individual hospitals within our state capitalize on the best possible practices that they can.”
An Honor and a Mission
Both Paolucci and Sellers were pleasantly surprised about receiving their awards. Sellers says she was honored to be nominated, “and then to actually receive the award…to be highlighted for the work that I love to do — it was really amazing.” Paolucci calls receiving the award “a humbling surprise,” and says that “it’s an honor for me to be able to represent my fellow NPs, and also to showcase the great work that NPs do here in such a small state.”
As both awardees continue in their careers, they also make time to mentor and guide the next generation of NPs. “It's really hard when you're starting out as a new provider to have the confidence that you need, but I had people at my side to give me the support that I needed,” Paolucci says, and he works to give new advanced practice providers (APPs) self-assurance. “I really think that the new APPs need somebody to take them under their wing and just answer the small questions for them. They don't need to be spoon-fed. They need to learn how to get information, and that's where I think a more experienced provider can teach them.” Sellers is also dedicated to inspiring the next generation of NPs. “When I do talks to NP students and nurses, I always tell them encourage people — always speak life into people. You never know who you’re helping to be great.”
Nominate a Deserving NP for the 2026 AANP State Award for Outstanding Contributions
Nominations for the 2026 AANP State Award for Outstanding Contributions are open until Oct. 1, 2025, at 11:59 p.m. PT. Current individual AANP members may nominate or self-nominate either an AANP member or non-member “who demonstrates excellence in alignment with the mission and goals of AANP in the areas of practice, education, advocacy, research or leadership (PEARL).”
Recipients of the 2026 AANP State Award for Outstanding Contributions will be honored during the AANP State Awards for Outstanding Contributions Ceremony at the respective AANP national conference; receive a waiver of the national conference registration fee; receive a professional photo with the AANP President; and receive an award ribbon given at the beginning of conference.