Regional awards program surpasses 100 honorees
SHAWNEE, Ohio – Seven Appalachian Ohioans whose extraordinary service has strengthened their communities were honored as the 2026 Jenco Award recipients during an Oct. 8 ceremony hosted by the Jenco Foundation and the Foundation for Appalachian Ohio (FAO) at the Tecumseh Theater.
The Jenco Awards recognize individuals across Appalachian Ohio’s 32 counties who have performed noteworthy community service outside their paid positions. The award recipients exemplify the difference everyday people can make when they give their time, talent and passion to serve their neighbors and communities.
The 2026 ceremony marked two milestones for the regional awards program: 15 years of partnership between the Jenco Foundation and FAO – and more than 100 Appalachian Ohioans honored for their service.
“This is a significant moment in our partnership and dedication to carrying forward the legacy of Father Lawrence Martin Jenco,” said Michelle Shively MacIver, Jenco Foundation committee member. “Behind these more than 100 Jenco Award recipients are thousands of acts of kindness, courage and selflessness by people who saw a need in their communities and decided they could make a difference. While each of their stories is unique, they all serve as a reminder that everyone has the ability to make life better for others, just as Father Jenco did throughout his life.”
The 2026 Jenco Award recipients, who were nominated by their fellow community members, are:
Sarah Adkins of Athens County was the founder and driving force behind a nonprofit pharmacy that became a lifeline for hundreds of Southeast Ohio households. A Southeast Ohio native and pharmacist, Adkins opened Rising Suns Non-Profit Pharmacy in 2021 to provide free, life-sustaining medications to uninsured and underinsured residents across Athens, Hocking, Meigs, Morgan, Perry, Vinton and Washington counties. Rising Suns served more than 1,000 patients over its five years of operation, helping prevent illness and death by removing cost as a barrier to essential care. Operating almost entirely on grants, donations and volunteers, the pharmacy provided more than $8 million in medication savings and helped ensure that people could get the medications they needed when they needed them.
Lisa Carroll of Gallia County has dedicated 10-plus years to serving children, families and communities across four Appalachian Ohio counties. In 2014, after the community answered her call to help support three families devastated by house fires, Carroll turned that outpouring of compassion into action, founding God’s Hands At Work, a faith-based nonprofit serving Gallia, Jackson, Meigs and Vinton counties. Carroll has grown the all-volunteer organization into a network of ministries and programs, offering everything from food and financial assistance to life-skills programming, educational opportunities and more. In providing both practical assistance and hope to those facing poverty and hardship, Carroll has also inspired many of those she has served to embark on their own journeys of service to others.
Judge Luann Cooperrider has presided over Perry’s County probate-juvenile court for over 35 years, but her commitment to community reaches far beyond the courtroom, championing programs that make critical resources more accessible to people who need them most. Since 2008, the free monthly legal clinic she helped launch has provided nearly 2,000 income-eligible residents with civil legal advice. Cooperrider also helped establish the ALPHA Program, an educational and intervention program for at-risk youth, as well as a juvenile corrections facility that allowed young offenders to remain closer to home. Through the Perry Housing Coalition, she tackles homelessness and affordable housing, and through the Community Foundation for Perry County, she is growing charitable giving to benefit the county’s residents and communities. Most recently, Cooperrider started the Wills for Vets program, providing essential legal documents to local veterans and their spouses.
Stephanie Laube of Guernsey County has spent two decades helping individuals and families move from homelessness and uncertainty toward safe, stable housing and a more secure future. In her previous professional work serving Guernsey County children and families, Laube saw that housing was a common challenge many of them faced. She co-founded the Samaritan Center of Guernsey County, a nonprofit that operates multiple transitional homes that provide residents not only a safe place to live but individualized case management to help them identify and overcome barriers to permanent housing. Laube leads the organization’s case management work and its fundraising efforts, securing resources needed to sustain the transitional homes and to provide emergency assistance to families at risk of becoming homeless.
Sandra Landis, Skip Ricketts and John Winnenberg are the visionaries behind a 50-year effort to rescue and revive the historic Tecumseh Theater, preserving a piece of community, pride and heritage in southern Perry County and the greater Hocking Valley region. In 1976, Ricketts stepped forward to purchase the building for $500 after learning it was slated for demolition. He and Winnenberg began leading community efforts to improve the building and secure funding to rehabilitate it. In 1990, Winnenberg and Landis, who passed away in 2021, formed the nonprofit Sunday Creek Associates to preserve and share the area’s unique history – and to oversee the theater. Under their leadership and through decades of persistence, they secured grants and other resources to fully restore the theater, culminating in its grand reopening in June 2026 – and just months later, serving as the setting for the Jenco Awards ceremony honoring their legacies of service.
The Jenco Foundation and the Jenco Awards uphold the legacy of Father Lawrence Martin Jenco, a Roman Catholic priest who dedicated his life to serving others. In 1985, Father Jenco was kidnapped while serving as director of Catholic Relief Services in Lebanon and spent 19 months in captivity. Even in confinement, Father Jenco continued to serve, providing a listening ear for other detainees, including journalist Terry Anderson.
Anderson, who passed away in 2024, founded the Jenco Foundation in 2001 to honor the legacy of his friend, who died in 1996. The Jenco Foundation joined FAO as an endowment in 2011, ensuring that Father Jenco’s legacy would live on in perpetuity. Since 2002, the Jenco Awards have celebrated more than 100 individuals who, like Father Jenco, have given of themselves and inspire others to serve their communities.