2014 April Event Speaker Bios

Kate Cervoni

Vice President of Eliassen Group

Kate serves as Vice President overseeing operations for the Quad States. Kate has over twenty years of experience in IT consulting services within many industries including the last 13 years in Media. Kate is all about connecting highly skilled people who have the desire and ability to contribute to helping clients successfully address the many challenges that arise in the course of running their businesses. Kate’s career consist of consulting and operational expertise and she has extensive experience in overall management of business development, recruiting, service delivery, and operations in large scale corporate environments as well as small and medium entrepreneurial organizations.

Stacey Fitch

Senior Coordinator Director, Production Operations, ESPN

Stacey also oversees the operations team of Content Editors who are responsible for editing for all ESPN highlight and information shows as well as the Business Resource team responsible for budgeting, booking and coordination of all Connecticut-based facilities. Collectively, these groups employ 230 operators, coordinators and managers.

In her previous roles at ESPN, Stacey led the operations team responsible for launching the Digital Center, SportsCenter and NFL in High Definition. She also directed the team of technical directors for the launch of the ESPNEWS network. In 2003 and 2005, Stacey and her teams earned “Technical Team Studio” Emmy awards for “This is SportsCenter” and the NFL Draft. Before coming to ESPN, Stacey spent more than twelve years in local television in the New York and Connecticut markets as a Director of live newscasts.

Stacey is actively involved in WICT at the national and chapter level. She is a graduate of the Betsy Magness Leadership Institute-Class XXIII and served on the New England Mentor program committee for four years. In 2012, Stacey received the WICT New England 2012 “Woman to Watch” award. In 2014, Stacey was selected as a Mentor for the American Corporate Partner program which helps veterans with career development by creating opportunities for mentoring and networking with professionals from national corporations and select universities.

Stacey holds a B.A. in communications from the State University of New York College of Brockport. She has been married for 24 years and has two children, Allison and Ryan. In her spare time, Stacey enjoys all things theatre from Community to Broadway, is hooked on Downton Abbey, and loves dinner and drinks with family and friends.

Jill Frederickson

Senior Coordinating Producer II, ESPN Bureaus

Jill Frederickson is the Senior Coordinating Producer in charge of the Bureaus at ESPN. The Bureau staff provides news and information content for ESPN’s flagship program SportsCenter. Frederickson is responsible for the people in the Bureau, including a Coordinating Producer, producers, reporters and photographers, who live in various portions of the country and are dispatched as news coverage warrants. She works with show units to determine the producer and reporter assignments and the content of what they will be contributing, whether a report summarizing the day’s events, or live shots during breaking news or features.

Prior to taking over the Bureaus, Frederickson oversaw ESPN’s event motorsports production, including NASCAR and the IndyCar Series. In addition, she oversaw ESPN’s NASCAR studio production, including NASCAR Now and NASCAR Countdown. While continuing her coordinating producer duties, in 2010 Jill produced the final seven NASCAR Sprint Cup race broadcasts of the season, culminating in the championship event in Homestead, Fla.

Frederickson joined ESPN as a coordinating producer in ESPN’s remote production in December 2003 and was promoted to senior coordinating producer in April 2008. Prior to becoming staff at ESPN, Jill was a freelance producer, working predominately for ESPN, producing auto racing, X Games, Great Outdoor Games and college basketball. She has won multiple Sports Emmy awards, including for her work on NBC’s coverage of the 1996 Summer Olympics as well as the Opening Tease for the 2006 Indianapolis 500 on ABC. An Indianapolis native, Jill graduated magna cum laude from DePauw University in Greencastle, Ind.

Laura Gremelsbacker

Director of Community Projects, NBC Connecticut

Laura serves as the Director of Community Projects and Public Relations for NBC Connecticut – which she describes as her dream job. She is responsible for the strategy and execution of their station initiative, Partners in a Caring Community. Prior to joining NBC Connecticut, Laura was the Communications Manager for Business Insurance at Travelers where she developed and strategized the communications for the Vice President of Business Intelligence and Chief Actuary. Laura has been able to utilize her Communications major (Public Relations & Promotion) throughout her career in media, nonprofit and the corporate sectors including holding Executive positions at Connecticut Special Olympics. She is proud of her volunteerism and is grateful that she’s been able to make a career of it.

Gina Iacomini

Director of Field Marketing, Cox Communications

Gina Iacomini has been with Cox Communications since 2004 serving in several roles including most recently Director of Field Marketing supporting the East, which includes Cox regions in the Northeast and Virginia. Prior to joining Cox, she served as Marketing Manager for RCN Boston. A graduate of University of Massachusetts, Iacomini holds a bachelor’s degree in Communications and an MBA from the University of Rhode Island. Iacomini is a past executive board member serving on the New England Chapter for Women in Cable Telecommunications and has been a WICT member for over 14 years. She has received numerous local, regional and national awards for her work with On Demand, Sales channel and Multi-cultural marketing.

Patricia Martin

Vice President, Network Operations, Cox Communications

Patricia Estrada Martin joined Cox Northeast Region in December 2012 as Vice President of Network Operations.

Martin is responsible for overseeing the day-to-day operation and engineering of the company’s video, data and telephony products in Rhode Island, Connecticut and Ohio.

Martin, who has more than 12 years of experience in the telecommunications industry, joined Cox in 2005. She joined Cox Northeast from Cox’s Oklahoma region, where as director of Network Services she was responsible for new build, repair, maintenance and upgrade on residential, commercial and wireless product lines.

Martin is a graduate of the University of Oklahoma, and now resides with her husband and children in Coventry, Rhode Island.

Noel Nash

Vice President of Emerging Businesses, Stats and Information Group, ESPN

After nearly 25 years in the daily newspaper business as a reporter, page designer and senior editor, Noel joined ESPN to help create the Stats & Analysis Team in 2006. A native of Miami, FL, his newspaper career took him to six different states, and he and his family are now living in Simsbury, CT.

Noel’s newspaper career started at Miami-Dade College, when he became freshman editor of The Falcon Times. The advisor was Jose Quevedo, one of the pioneers of modern newspaper design and a passionate journalism professor. Noel was hired as a full-time reporter at The Miami News during his sophomore year at MDC.

At The Miami News, he was fortunate to work with some of the industry’s top journalists, including Leo Suarez and Tom Archdeacon. When The News folded in 1988, he joined The Palm Beach Post on a part-time basis and worked his way from a clerk to the lead page designer for the Sports section.

The Gainesville Sun hired Noel to help launch a weekly sports tabloid at the paper, and a year later he was asked to become the executive sports editor of the daily section. The University of Florida football team won its first national title during this time, leading to multiple special sections and books. The Sun was a New York Times-owned paper, and Noel stayed within The Times’ company when he accepted the job of managing editor at the TimesDaily in Florence, Ala. Among the stories he led coverage of in Alabama were the death of Gov. George Wallace, the release of the Starr Report and Ozzie Newsome’s induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

In 2001, he left Alabama to help the DailyHerald (Provo, UT) plan and execute its coverage of the 2002 Winter Olympics. Shortly after those Games ended, he moved to The Dallas Morning News and oversaw coverage of high-profile teams/sports such as the Cowboys/NFL, Rangers/MLB and all of its local and pro golf coverage.

Noel joined ESPN in 2006 as a senior director, helping create and lead the Stats & Analysis Team at ESPN, which is responsible for all real-time and historical data, across every sport and platform, domestically and internationally. Television, Digital and Mobile platforms provided new challenges and opportunities. In 2012, he was promoted to Vice President within the Stats & Information Group (SIG) at ESPN, with specific oversight of Emerging Businesses. His new duties include oversight of the BottomLine, SIG’s international expansion, advertising and marketing concerns, and more.

Currently, he helps lead a staff of more than 230 part- and full-time employees around the globe who generate unique and differentiating content across all media platforms.

Noel has been married to Denise since 1990, and they have two children, Benjamin (22 years old) and Melissa (21 years old).