ISSIP Spotlights 2026 Distinguished Recognition Recipients for Impact to SOCIETY and Impact to INNOVATION

SANTA CLARA, CA, UNITED STATES, May 13, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ --
Earlier this month, the International Society of Service Innovation Professionals (ISSIP), the nonprofit serving as a bridge from knowledge to impact in Service Innovation benefiting our interconnected world, announced winners of the 2025 Excellence in Service Innovation and Distinguished Recognition Awards.

Today the organization shone a spotlight on the specific projects meriting distinguished recognition, as rigorously judged via independent scoring on uniqueness, creativity, technical merit, value generation and impact of the innovative solution in each of three categories: ‘impact to business,’ ‘impact to society’ and ‘impact to innovation.’

Said Haluk Demirkan, 2026 President of ISSIP,

“We are pleased to recognize the excellence of service innovation efforts underway throughout the global ISSIP community. This year’s submissions represented the best of the ISSIP community across industry, academia, NGO and government entities, with initiatives calibrated to benefit people, business and/or society in meaningful ways,”

Each award winning organization and team is invited to share their innovation project or initiative with the ISSIP Community, in ISSIP’s Weekly Speaker Series in the coming months. Recordings will be uploaded to ISSIP Youtube and the slides uploaded to ISSIP Slideshare, to foster learning and growth for all.

There were eight additional recipients of distinguished recognition for impact to BUSINESS, who will be recognized in a separate release on the work, and social media follow-up to recognizing individual team contributors. The recipients for:

DISTINGUISHED RECOGNITION FOR IMPACT TO SOCIETY:

Trade & EduBridge
SUMMARY: Trade&EduBridge – Turkey-USA Pathways is a first-of-its-kind initiative that merges international education, trade, and cultural exchange under one platform. Unlike traditional student placement services, it leverages Turk Expo USA‚ established network of business expos and trade partnerships to build direct relationships between Turkish students, American schools, and industry leaders. This approach creates not only academic opportunities but also exposure to innovation, entrepreneurship, and global business ecosystems. The program integrates technology-driven matching tools, personalized mentorship, and cross-sector collaboration to ensure that education becomes a bridge to both professional growth and international cooperation. By combining educational mobility with trade and innovation networks, EduBridge introduces a holistic model that nurtures future global leaders while strengthening economic and cultural ties between Turkey and the United States.

Organization: TurkExpo USA
Primary Contact: Meltem Cinar
Meltem Cinar , Goktug Cinar

DISTINGUISHED RECOGNITION FOR IMPACT TO INNOVATION

SUMMARY: HuskyHack
HuskyHack is a two-phase fintech innovation challenge co-hosted by Sound Credit Union and the University of Washington Tacoma. It brings together college students across Washington State to design, build, and pitch fintech solutions that improve financial health and enhance the credit union member experience. Unlike traditional hackathons that focus only on ideas, HuskyHack emphasizes working proofs of concept, user-centered design, and real-world feasibility. Participants receive mentorship and expert feedback while developing solutions that address practical financial challenges such as organizing and maximizing benefits, rewards, and opportunities that often go unclaimed. Submissions are evaluated on innovation, impact, execution, user experience, scalability, and clarity, ensuring outputs are both creative and implementable. The program is designed to be repeatable and scalable, serving as a sustainable model for university‚ industry collaboration in service innovation.

Organization: Sound Credit Union, University of Washington Tacoma
Primary Contact: Michael Turek
TEAM: Jennifer Reed, Michael Turek , Lindsey Kealoha, Ozge Kantar-Boyraz, Thanh Thai, Raihab Baig, Haluk Demirkan


More about the International Society of Service Innovation Professionals (ISSIP)
ISSIP is a diverse and growing global non-profit, recognized for the quality of its service science knowledge and thought leadership, caliber of events and publishing, annual Excellence in Service Innovation and Distinguished Recognition Awards and growing global programs, such as the AI Collab, Ambassadors, Publishing and MyT-me. ISSIP is free to individuals and funded by donors and partners who collaborate to leverage the ISSIP platform to amplify and scale mission-aligned initiatives -- to advance technology driven, people-centered service innovation to benefit people, business and society. For more, and to join or partner, please go to www.issip.org.

Michele Carroll
ISSIP, Executive Director
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