In March of this year, IFIC was fully anticipating that we would be presenting our 20th Annual Congress in Belgrade Serbia. I traveled to the region prior to the start of our conference, stopping in Zagreb, Croatia to meet with a colleague. My goal was to make the presentation of IFIC’s 2020 Graham Ayliffe Award to Professor Smilja Kalenic. Even though our conference was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, I met with Professor Kalenic and with her colleague, Professor Ana Budimir at the School of Public Health, University of Zagreb, on 6 March 2020. Professor Kalenic served on the IFIC Board for 8 years (2002-2009). She then was Editor of the International Journal of Infection Control (IJIC) for several years has continued as a member of IJIC’s Editorial Board. She served on various IFIC Congress committees. Using the IFIC text, Basic Concepts, she assisted in the development of an accompanying IPC training course. Furthermore, she translated the text and the training course for her Croatian colleagues and has used that course to train many in the region in IPC and microbiology. As an educator, Professor Kalenic is known by many not only in her country of Croatia, but in the broader region as well. She has frequently taught courses throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina. She has always been willing to share her vast knowledge with others. Credited with being a regional expert in surveillance, Professor Kalenic was responsible for setting up the first program for surveillance of HAIs in the Baltic/Eastern European area, thanks to a grant provided by industry. She brought a focus on IFIC as an organization and on IPC programs for the entire region. Because of her enormous contributions to international infection prevention and control, we offer our hearty congratulations to Professor Smilja Kalenic, as IFIC’s recipient of the 2020 Graham Ayliffe Award of Excellence!