Federal Workers Who Made a Difference
The federal government gets a bad rap: it is constantly described as bloated and clunky, its workers as inefficient and ineffectual. Yet by and large, the men and women who make up the federal workforce rise above the criticism, put one foot in front of the other and do their job. Rarely is the work they do acknowledged, much less praised. But for the past 16 years, the Samuel J. Heyman Service to America Medals, or Sammies, have sought to change that by honoring federal employees who have an outsize impact on the country and the world. Below, the 2017 Sammie winners, chosen by the nonpartisan Partnership for Public Service.