December 2019 Appreciation
Louise-the custodian who takes care of the 3rd floor of Rood Hall. She’s amazing! She’s a hard worker with a kind heart. It’s a pleasure to work alongside her.
Posted By: Katie Easley
Tyler Sonnenberg-Ward, the CEHD Web Content Specialist. I want to thank him for his coordination and leadership on the CEHD Staff Advisory Committee since Fall 2018. This coordination is outside of Tyler's official job duties, but he has taken it on and is always positive and solution-focused, even when confronted with some significant resistance to changes recommended by the committee--such as the name and focus on the December celebration. He also oversees two the CEHD staff appreciation efforts including the CEHD High Five Award and Staff Semi-Annual Award--both of which have undergone positive changes over the past year. I appreciate working with Tyler because he is so thoughtful, inclusive, considerate, kind, follows through, and always has a smile on his face.
Posted By: Laura Ciccantell
Sarah Summy, Professor in the Department of Special Education and Literacy Studies. Sarah was instrumental in the preparation for and (preliminary) results of the recent teacher education accreditation visit by the Council for Accreditation of Education Programs (CAEP). She took the lead on the area in which we had the least data (graduates impact on K12 students) and created and implemented procedures for gathering and disseminating that data. She also collaborated with WMU faculty and staff and K12 colleagues to help ensure that WMU was well able to document and demonstrate the great work done across the university and in the community to prepare teachers to positively impact the lives of K12 students.
And, she did all this work for CAEP while also teaching undergraduate and graduate students, co-chairing the WES implementation, coordinating the Special Education program, and co-leading summer study abroad to Africa.
Posted By: Laura Ciccantell
On Friday, December 13th, Christina Dersch, a Production Operations Specialist in the Office of Information Technology traveled to Ellsworth Hall and volunteered to spend the day helping an overwhelmed Scanning Services Team catch up on what turned out to be nearly three days of backlogged finals week scanning requests. The last scanning request was processed at 4:57 PM, 3 minutes before the 5 PM deadline. Without Christina's help the 5 PM deadline would never have been reached. Christina has spent the last 10 years providing scanning services to the campus community which put her in the unique position of being one of the few (if not the only) people on campus who could step in and help avert what could have been a potentially disastrous finals week event. Thank you Christina for going above and beyond in support of WMU's faculty and students!!
Posted By: Tom Wolf
Dorilee Crown and Kathleen Drzewiecki. Dorilee and Kathleen have dedicated a tremendous amount of time - in addition to all the effort they dedicate to running their respective departments - to creating a useful onboarding and reference manual for administrative functions and daily operations of academic affairs units. It is one thing to recognize an existing need, but it is another thing entirely to take action to remedy the unmet need. This is precisely what Kathleen and Dorilee have done in developing such a complex and fluid document. There is no question that this electronic tool can and will have an extraordinary and positive impact on the work of staff members within and well beyond academic affairs. Thank you, Kathleen and Dorilee. You are changing our campus for the better!
Posted By: Haylee Knowles
Karen Stokes Chapo and Tonya Dean for their hard work in making our small unit impactful for the entire university community. We would not be able to accomplish the things we do without their hard work and dedication. Their work largely goes unnoticed and I would like to use this opportunity to acknowledge them. Thank you!
Posted By: Dave Reinhold