NAACCR Announces New Executive Director: Karen Knight

It is an honor and a privilege to announce that the next Executive Director of NAACCR will be Ms. Karen Knight.  Following a nationwide search, Ms. Knight was selected based on her outstanding experience in cancer surveillance and registration, making her uniquely qualified for this leadership position.  Karen has over 22 years of progressive leadership experience in public health statistics at the state and federal levels. She served as Assistant Director and Director of the North Carolina Central Cancer Registry in the late 1990s and early 2000s and served as Treasurer to the NAACCR Board during that time. She was promoted to Director of the North Carolina State Center for Health Statistics in 2010. Many of you may know Karen in her current role as Chief of Registry Development at NAACCR. You can read more about Ms. Knight’s extensive professional experience in the official press release here.

The process for selecting the new ED was led by a dedicated Task Force that began work in the Fall of 2023. The Task Force held multiple listening sessions across NAACCR staff, membership, and partners to identify the critical leadership qualities necessary for the position in a rapidly evolving field. A job announcement with these key characteristics was posted in early spring and garnered a highly qualified candidate pool. After initial screenings, a set of finalists were selected, from whom the staff and Board had the opportunity to interview and hear their vision of cancer surveillance in greater depth. Deliberations and a final vote of confidence by the Board was decided at the June NAACCR annual meeting in Boise, Idaho.

We are thrilled to welcome Karen in her new role as Executive Director beginning in September, and to ensure a successful transition a dedicated task force has been established to guide the process over the next six months. In the meantime, Betsy continues to serve in her role as Executive Director of NAACCR during this busy time of year.