Obituary: Kimberly M. Perry

Jeffrey M. Cucina & Kathleen A. Stewart, U.S. Customs and Border Protection

On January 24, 2020, the I-O psychology community lost a valued colleague and friend with the passing of Dr. Kimberly “Kim” Perry.  Dr. Perry was 36 years old at the time of her death.  A native of Wisconsin, Kim resided in the Washington, DC area.  Dr. Perry was a gifted scholar, receiving numerous awards, honors, and scholarships throughout her academic career.  Kim received her undergraduate degree in Psychology and French from St. Cloud University and her PhD in I-O Psychology from the University of Missouri-St. Louis in 2013. In graduate school, Dr. Perry worked for E·A·S·I–Consult in St. Louis, Missouri while also serving as a statistics consultant, course instructor, and contractor for projects with Maritz, Inc. and Anheuser-Busch, Inc. 

Dr. Perry’s work at E·A·S·I–Consult evolved into a position as an I-O psychologist with the U.S. Secret Service in Washington, DC, focusing on personnel selection.  At the U.S. Secret Service, she managed the assessment programs for entry-level special agents and uniformed division personnel, facilitated successful execution of a multi-million-dollar contract, drafted multiple agency-wide policies, and revamped the merit promotion process for special agents. 

Dr. Perry joined the Personnel Research and Assessment Division of U.S. Customs and Border Protection in 2016.  Serving as a personnel research psychologist, she led a number of critical projects for the agency including physical-fitness-test job-analysis and validation studies, a validation of the agency’s entry-level language-testing program, a job analysis of the agency’s new Global Trade Specialist position, a comprehensive time-to-hire law-enforcement benchmarking study, and several survey-research projects.  She was also integral to the psychometric analyses for a new computer-adaptive-testing program. 

Kim’s colleagues were always impressed by her willingness to volunteer for tasks and her ability to handle a wide range of project work, including complex statistical analyses, contracting, and technical-report writing.  She was a sought-after teammate and a mentor, a psychologist with whom all of her colleagues enjoyed working and spending time both at and outside of work.  Dr. Perry was a frequent contributor to the SIOP conference and would have given three SIOP presentations in 2020.  She was very active, and enjoyed traveling, cake decorating, reviewing books, the French language, and Pure Barre classes.  Dr. Perry was a wonderfully complex individual: graceful, poised, quietly elegant, with a dry sense of humor, and engaging smile. She is missed greatly by all who knew her.  More information can be found at https://www.lyndahl.com/obituary/KimberlyKim-Perry.

Note.  The views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of U.S. Customs and Border Protection or the U.S. Federal Government.