Congratulations to the winners of this year's CoE staff awards, and thank you to everyone who took the time to nominate a colleague. Scroll down to find out who took home this year's awards, including the Rising Star Award, Team Builder Award, Hero Award, and T'xpert Award, as well as the coveted Buzz Trophy for the school competition.
Rising Star Award:
The award is for individuals beginning their career at GT within the past 3 years. It recognizes a staff member who has created or utilized an opportunity to grow and develop in their role and as a result, has made important contributions to their unit.
The recipient is Ben Galfond, Lab & Facilities Coordinator in CHBE. He was nominated by David Sholl.
Ben was hired to serve as the key support person for all of the CHBE undergraduate teaching labs. Since joining CHBE in summer 2016, he has taken a pro-active approach to improve the student experience. He produced a series of pre-lab videos for each lab experience and found other ways to greatly improve the efficiency of students taking the lab courses. In addition, he serves as a mentor to a student group and genuinely enjoys spending time to help broaden the student experience.
One of his letters states: “In summary, Dr. Galfond makes an impact on our undergraduate education in an area which is often short-changed. His efforts help place us in the category of elite undergraduate programs.”
Team Builder Award:
This award is for an individual that fosters a work environments that supports others, passes on knowledge and experience, demonstrates flexibility, and helps the group achieve productive results.
The recipient is Sally Gerrish, Corporate Relations Manager in BME nominated by Ross Ethier.
Sally has been the mainstay of BME student placement activities since the department was founded. She has literally helped thousands of our students find jobs. She does this with wonderful good humor and is much beloved by all faculty, staff and, especially students.
One of her letters states: “I am very proud of the entire student support team that we have in the Coulter Department. Sally is the spark that animates the team, infusing leadership and effectiveness in entire students support activities. She leads by example, providing a warm and supportive environment for our students while being incredibly competent and getting the job done. She freely shares her expertise and wisdom with colleagues. She always pitches in to the the job done, even if it means extra time and lot of extra trouble. “
Hero Award:
The award is recognizes an individual who is a role model, is committed to the delivery of excellent service and results always, and is the person the everyone turns to for support or solutions.
The recipient is Lori Federico, Assistant to the Chair in CHBE nominated by David Sholl.
Upon her arrival in CHBE in 2012, Lori quickly established herself as the person in CHBE who had an extensive understanding of GT policies and procedures and was both willing and able to deal with any issue, task or question that arose. In her role, both faculty and staff can watch her apply her remarkable abilities to an endless array of functions within the school from seemingly simple task to big events with 2,000 participants. She is the ideal representative and face of our school who accomplishes each of these tasks with a smile and a perfectly calm demeanor, which puts everyone at ease.
One of her letters states: Her classy way of resolving issues, which included dealing with complex personalities and issues, and her thoughtfulness in addressing sensitive concerns made her a real winner.”
T’xpert Award:
This is a new award this year and recognizes an exceptional individual who has made outstanding contributions to technical services with positive impact to support unit mission in addition to promoting a positive work experience through respect, support and collegiality.
The recipient is Marion Crowder, Instructional Media Producer in ECE nominated by Julie Ridings. Dr. Ed Coyle accepted the award on his behalf while he was on vacation.
Marion is an instructional media producer, but in reality he is a one-person service unit. While his position entails recording and producing videos, Marion stays abreast of Institute standards for web-based video content and ensures departmental compliance. GT standards for accessibility now require closed captioning of all video content. Marion has taken a three-pronged approach to ensure compliance. This has required Marion to expand his knowledge and skills and it illustrates his dedication to providing excellent service to the school and Institute. His work also has enabled ECE instructors to “flip” their classrooms. This requires extensive planning, scheduling and media management and very proactive. The result is video of very high production value for the flipped courses.
One of his letters states: “At one appointment when I was to record a lecture module, Marion saw that I had worn a shirt that was not compatible with raster recording. Marion literally loaned me “the shirt off his back” so that we could proceed with the taping as scheduled. This is certainly beyond the call of duty!”
Buzz Award for School Spirit
Each school was challeneged to come up with a farewell video for Dean May as he prepared to head to UC Davis where he now serves as chancellor. He then judged the submissions and chose ECE's entry as being most representative of his personality. Great job everyone, and congratulations to ECE.
