- Author: Jodi Azulai
UC ANR presented its annual Staff Appreciation and Recognition (STAR) Awards June 18 to individuals and teams demonstrating exceptional performance, creativity, organizational abilities, work success and teamwork.
The STAR program is an opportunity to celebrate and reward the great contributions of ANR's people. The program provides one-time cash awards to eligible staff in recognition of outstanding achievement.
John Fox, executive director of Human Resources, announced the STAR recipients and managers presented plaques to the following employees.
During the absence of an essential team member, Alma enthusiastically assumed higher-level responsibilities for all immigration-related visas and permanent-residency cases. Her dedicated work allowed Academic HR to provide a level of service to which international scholars are accustomed.
Alyssa demonstrated a high level of quality performance while she absorbed additional responsibilities as our temporary Leaves specialist. Not only did she learn and implement her new role quickly and efficiently, she also updated and improved Leave processes, while maintaining a high level of involvement with the HR Generalist staff.
Bonnie Nielsen, communications specialist, UCCE Marin
Bonnie willingly took on significant additional event logistics and outreach roles for the 7th Sudden Oak Death Science Symposium, helping to make it a success. She contributed to the creative thinking and site architecture design and performed all the web layout and revision for the Grown in Marin website makeover. Learning new software, she provided peer leadership to the staff, leading the layout and production of the office's 2018 Annual Report as an online story map.
With many difficult technical obstacles to overcome, Cheryl planned for and transferred 19 UC IPM online courses to eXtension, while delivering all of her other tasks without interruption. Her regular duties include timely reporting of DPR CE units, technical support to UC IPM online courses, developing two new courses, and hosting a series of UC PM webinars “UC Ag Experts Talk.”
Debbie Powell, Master Gardener coordinator, UCCE Calaveras & Tuolumne
Debbie aired her 100th radio show “Over the Garden Gate” on station KAAD-LP, 103.5 FM, which she started as an innovative way to provide educational material on home gardening and related topics. Since Feb 2017, she has regularly interviewed staff, UC Master Gardener Volunteers, subject matter experts and presenters at the Open Garden at the Master Gardener Demonstration Garden in San Andreas.
Hannah drove outreach efforts to bring awareness to the unique research opportunity resulting from the unplanned wildfire, served as central organizer of a successful packed weekend of events around Hopland REC's annual sheep dog trails that raised over $10,000 net, and led successful fundraising and grant-writing efforts including winning a grant from the EPA to develop fire science curriculum adapted for the North Coast woodlands.
Jon Wilson, applications architect, ANR IT
Jon's expertise and effective communication has revolutionized Communication Services & Information Technology service to ANR. His dedication to highest quality products is evidenced by his extraordinary work with Project Board. He has also assumed responsibility for technical oversight of all applications developed and maintained by CSIT, challenging each team developer to keep quality and user experience at the forefront of every decision.
John is serving as both Hopland REC superintendent and interim director and he has performed beyond all expectations. His innovative thinking will result in better financial stability in the midst of severe cuts. His leadership allowed ranch staff to move 500 sheep, 6 guard dogs, and one sheep dog to safety during the River Fire. He also quickly organized an event on the ranch on Sept. 6 to showcase the burn areas for potential wildfire recovery research.
Karina Hathorn, community education specialist, UCCE Butte
In 2018, Karina worked to produce content for a garden-based workshop for SNAP-Ed. Her organization throughout curriculum development was impressive. During every planning meeting, she came prepared and presented to her CalFresh collaborators in a clear and meaningful manner. Her work effortlessly tied the training objectives to interactive modules, which allowed participants to apply the content they learned to the garden.
Kathleen's work has led her UCCE office to develop a budget that forecasts long-term staffing needs and ensures staffing levels align with funding levels and sources. Her organizational skills ensure on-time report submissions that include impact stories for our partners and the public. Her skill in recognizing both emerging opportunities for teamwork and the challenges to implementing it across programs brings excellence to UCCE San Mateo-San Francisco as a whole.
Kellie McFarland, event specialist, ANR Program Support
Kellie managed the day-to-day tasks for all PSU staff when her director and another PSU staff member were on leave and another retired. She ensured that staff handled assignments and the unit's work continued. As Event Specialist 2 and lead, Kellie is an exceptionally high performer serving as a role model for other staff members. She is extremely productive and handles the most complex events independently. She attacks every task with tenacity, drive and positive attitude.
Leah consistently demonstrates exceptional performance as an EFNEP supervisor in Alameda and Contra Costa counties. She is highly respected by her staff, academic advisor, UCCE colleagues and external partners. She often mentors other EFNEP supervisors and represents EFNEP staff on two University-wide committees. Leah excels because she leads by example and is a woman of high integrity and organizational capacity.
Mary Vollinger, community education supervisor, UCCE San Mateo, San Francisco, Santa Clara
Mary stepped up to fill the role of the retired SNAP-Ed work plan coordinator. She has done an amazing job of coordinating 17 Snap-Ed funded partners and ensuring commitments to deadlines. Her creativity and can-do attitude led to an increased cross-program collaboration and great work success in all three counties.
Susan led a high-quality “teens as teachers” program that effectively strengthened 30 adolescents' leadership skills. She mentored 4-H volunteers in management roles to address the low rate of younger youths participating in club meetings. She facilitated the brainstorming of ideas and mentored volunteers to iterate and implement their ideas. The club encouraged attendance with more age-appropriate activities, which increased young people's attendance and engagement.
Pam Kan Rice, assistant director, News and Information Outreach
Pam demonstrated and sustained exceptional performance that consistently exceeded goals and work expectations. She took on numerous additional duties, including social media and governmental relations, due to several CSIT position vacancies while producing high-quality work and carrying on effective collaborations.
Rob has shown his unique talents and willingness to go above and beyond. He has developed creative approaches to projects resulting in dollars saved. He is known for his customer service and efforts to build a strong and positive work environment. He staged and produced the first in a series of Development Services webinars, using his personal home-studio equipment, often on his time, making the content come alive in an extremely professional manner.
Robin Sanchez, Interim Director, Administrative Policy and Business Contracts
Robin has managed her unit to achieve efficiencies and do more with less. As interim director, she and her unit have continued to provide good, timely service to ANR clientele. She has been a champion in implementing technology and tools to drive efficiency. Robin managed the development of a digital repository for all of UC ANR contacts and MOUs and subsequently implemented an instance Box to better manage in-process work on contracts and agreements.
Vince has been repeatedly successful in developing educational resources and events and partnering on programs that have beneficial impact at the local, Marin and North Bay level, including programs this year on farmworker housing replacement, pond water use monitoring, and on-farm poultry processing.
Evan Talmage, evaluation analyst, Nutrition Policy Institute
Evan is one of NPI's most agreeable and cheerful employees. In December 2018, he juggled multiple high-priority deadlines, yet found time to complete an analysis of GIS data, identifying restaurants in low-income neighborhoods for our Healthy Default Beverage Study. This sample of restaurants was a crucial part of a very high-priority NPI project, with baseline data collection needing to be completed before Senate Bill 1192, which prohibits restaurants from serving soda or juice with kids' meals, went into effect on Jan. 1, 2019.
Sara quickly established herself as a generous team player. She has helped cross-train another staff member, proactively reviewed all grant proposal instructions, and prepared a thorough set of instructions and a detailed timeline for principal investigators at NPI and our partnering organizations. She also coordinated with funders and Contracts & Grants to ensure that all proposal submissions and fund reports would be completed accurately and on time.
Team awards
EFNEP Alameda/Contra Costa Team - Nelly Camacho, Jennifer Ferreira, Eli Figueroa, Santos Lopez, Adan Osorio, Molica Sim
These youth educators significantly impacted student behavior. Partnering with 333 teachers and reaching 8,090 K-12 youth, their students reported a 71% increase in their ability to choose healthy foods and often report sharing their learning with their families.
Project Board Team - Joni Rippee, Jon Wilson, Bryon Noel, Dave Krause, Kit Alviz, Katherine Webb-Martinez, Tina Jordan, Kim Ingram, Chris Greer, Sheila Barry, Chris Hanson
Even though the Project Board Team members juggle many priorities in the Division, each person committed to a demanding meeting schedule and delivery milestones, all of which were met on time and under budget. The extraordinary amount of collaboration and team work in the Project Board Team are foundational to the success of this project.
Giving Tuesday Campaign - Emily Delk and Melissa Womack
Emily Delk of Development Services and Melissa Womack of UC Master Gardener Program worked outside their scope to collaborate across departments during the November 2018 Giving Tuesday Campaign. Their commitment and hard work resulted in a total of $121,262 raised, a 59% increase over the previous year.
Tulare & Kings Nutrition Education Team - Grilda Gomez, Elia Escalante, Marina Aguilera, Maria Gutierrez, Yesenia Medrano, Susan Lafferty, Maria Carbajal, Eldon Bueno, Teresa Spicer, Mariana Lopez
UC CalFresh and EFNEP teams worked with community partners to empower children, youth and families with knowledge, skills and behavior change to eat healthfully and be active. They contributed to a healthier Tulare and Kings community and aligned program goals with UC ANR's strategic initiative of Healthy Families, Healthy Communities.
Nutrition Policy Institute Team - Sarah Brizindine, Tamika Green, Phoebe Harpainter, Dani Lee, Sridharshi Hewawitharana, Meirong Liao, Shelly Mandel, Anna Martin, Kaela Plank, Evan Talmage
What could easily have taken one year, the NPI staff accomplished in 3 months. They collected baseline data from enough restaurants statewide to be able to examine changes resulting from Senate Bill 1192. They worked evenings and weekends to complete their work by the Jan. 1, 2019 deadline.
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