GUEST – Nancy Varallo, Ed Varallo, Ray Catuogno, Sr., George Catuogno

Bios:

Nancy Varallo is a Registered Diplomate Reporter and Certified Realtime Reporter.  She began her court reporting career as a freelancer in 1979.  In 2001 she founded The Varallo Group, which offers a unique suite of services designed to help court reporters and firm owners achieve business success.  The Varallo Group serves as the management company for STAR, the Florida Court Reporters Association, and Project Steno.  Nancy is a founding member and Executive Director of Project Steno.

Nancy — a court reporter, educator, and business owner — is committed to time-honored values of quality, service, and accountability.  She believes in life-long learning and volunteerism.  Nancy received the Distinguished Service Award from the National Court Reporting Association in the summer of 2017.  She was the 2013-2014 NCRA President and was inducted as a Fellow of the National Academy of Professional Reporters in 2001.

Nancy is called “Fearless Leader” by her StenOps team which is currently at work at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.  She is married to NCRA’s six-time speed champion and court reporting legend Ed Varallo.

Ed Varallo comes from a family of court reporters and began his career straight out of high school. In 1965, on his 19th birthday, he became the youngest person ever to pass the Certificate of Merit exam (now the RMR). Best known for his speed contest accomplishments (a perfect score on the 280 Q&A in 1975, the first-ever perfect score in a national speed contest) he has six times been NCRA’s National Speed Champion, winning three years consecutively, 1974-76, ten years later in 1986, again in 1996, and again in 2006 — a unique speed contest record.

Ed began his career as a freelancer in Philadelphia. After three years as an official reporter in the Court of Chancery in Wilmington, Delaware in the early ’70s, he opened a freelance firm in that city which he ran until coming to Boston in 1988, where he worked until retiring in 2020.

Ed got his first CAT system in 1978 and reported his first realtime assignment in 1983. Over the past three decades he has addressed reporters at national and state association seminars on the topics of writing for CAT, speedbuilding, CART, and writing realtime, and is the author of The Realtime Writer’s Manual (pub. 1992) and Ed’s Steno Pro (pub. 2013), as well as numerous articles for the JCR (Journal of Court Reporting), the official publication of the National Court Reporters Association. He became a CRR (Certified Realtime Reporter) in 1994.

In the 1990s Ed actively promoted CART (communications access realtime) for deaf and hard-of-hearing people. He was a CART provider and helped raise awareness of this new field as a frequent instructor in CART trainings for court reporters. He was part of the team assisting the Massachusetts Commission for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing in the development of its first-in-the-nation CART program. In 1995 the Association of Late-Deafened Adults presented Ed its ALDA Angel Award.

Ed has been a Fellow of NCRA’s Academy of Professional Reporters (FAPR) since 1976, and was the recipient of the 1994 Distinguished Service Award of the Massachusetts Court Reporters Association. Following his last speed contest win, in 2006, The Boston Globe interviewed Ed and called him “the Michael Jordan of court reporting.” In 2007 Ed was chosen by NCRA for its highest honor, the Distinguished Service Award.

Ed retired from court reporting in 2020 — in the 56th year of his court reporting career.

Ray Catuogno entered the Court Reporting Profession as a Voice Writer for the Navy in 1958.  After his honorable discharge, he attended court reporting school and became one of the first Steno Court Reporters in Springfield, Massachusetts in 1965.  Ten years later he opened his own court reporting agency, Catuogno Court Reporting, which he turned into a family business that his daughter and two sons joined.  His company grew to one of the largest in the region with over 100 employees and five locations across New England.  Ray sold his company and retired in 2018 at the age of 80!  He remains active and looks forward to attending the Unity Summit in Orlando in May.

George Catuogno is the Executive Director at STAR and the Chief Operations Officer at The Varallo Group LLC, a management services organization supporting court reporting firms across the country. With a 40-year career in the court reporting industry, he served as the President of Catuogno Court Reporting and also built a national transcription company called StenTel.  He served on the Board of Directors for the Medical Transcription Industry Association from 2005-2009, and served as a member of the Project Steno Advisory Council in more recent years.  His vast experience and leadership in the industry have solidified his reputation as a respected and influential figure in the court reporting and transcription industries.