Kevin Salvador Recipient of 2025 California Direct Support Professional of the Year Award
National Disability Provider Association Names Noah Homes’ Kevin Salvador Recipient of 2025 California Direct Support Professional of the Year Award
Recognition honors professionals exemplifying a workforce that empowers community inclusion for people with intellectual, developmental disabilities
ANCOR, the leading voice in Washington for community-based disability services providers, has announced that Kevin Salvador, a direct support professional at Noah Homes, has been named the recipient of the 2025 California Direct Support Professional of the Year award. Salvador joins 53 other honorees in the 2025 edition of ANCOR’s annual Direct Support Professional of the Year Awards program. This year’s awards garnered over 500 nominations from across the nation, a record-breaking total.
“The entire Noah Homes community is proud of Kevin as he receives this national honor,” says Sandra Rocco-Melville, Executive Director of Noah Homes. “This award recognizes his dedication to fostering inclusion in a community-based, person-centered environment for the individuals we support. Kevin’s work has transformed the lives of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. We are so pleased to celebrate him!”
Since 2007, ANCOR’s annual DSP of the Year awards recognize outstanding direct support professionals (DSPs) who deliver long-term services and supports to people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (I/DD). The awards celebrate the important role DSPs play in ensuring people with I/DD have what they need to thrive and be included in the community.
These awards also seek to raise awareness about a direct support workforce in crisis. Inadequate investments in this essential workforce have led to a decades-long severe shortage of DSPs, which risks being exacerbated significantly as Congress weighs substantial cuts to Medicaid, the program that funds the vast majority of services delivered by the direct support workforce.
“I began my career as a direct support professional, and so I have witnessed firsthand just how powerful a difference a qualified and committed DSP can make in the lives of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities,” said Lori Kress, president of ANCOR’s Board of Directors and CEO of Dungarvin in Mendota Heights, Minn. “But DSPs of Kevin Salvador’s caliber truly raise the bar on what it means to deliver world-class support.”
Barbara Merrill, chief executive officer for ANCOR, added: “It is truly a pleasure to hear stories day in and day out about the magic that DSPs make possible as they deliver services that are nothing short of transformative for people with I/DD. It’s the very reason ANCOR began the DSP of the Year Awards program nearly two decades ago, and it’s why we are very much looking forward to celebrating the outstanding professionals like Kevin Salvador in San Diego next week.”
Salvador and the other 2025 honorees will be recognized during an awards ceremony in San Diego, Calif., on Wednesday, April 9 during ANCOR Connect ’25, the association’s annual conference.