The following MIT community members have been recognized for going the extra mile. Thank someone today.
Page 10
Jennie Leith
My trackpad on my laptop decided to just stop working. So, I freaked out and called Jennie to initially report to A/A Help for me. Since I couldn't click on any file to write a message, she thought of using a mouse. Now I'm back in business as you can't do much without being able to click.
Ping Lee, A/A
Rachel Bigler, Community Wellness
Rachel has poured her time, energy, and heart into creating a web, video, and social media presence to help the MIT Community to find virtual opportunities to manage their stress, care for themselves and others, and maintain balance during a very imbalanced time. She has helped new and expecting parents, faculty, staff, and students find the right resource at the right time. Rachel is a rock star.
Zan Barry, Community Wellness at MIT Medical
Lauren Pouchak, OVC, Gus Burkett, DSL, Elizabeth Young, First-Year Advising and all the Student Success Coaches!
Lauren, Gus, and Elizabeth created a massive student coaching program within about a week, and hundreds of amazing student success coaches volunteered from across MIT to support students far and wide. The talent, hard work, and dedication of this group is a perfect example of the best of the MIT spirit.
Zan Barry, Community Wellness at MIT Medical
Chris Durham and the HR/Payroll Team
Thanks to Chris Durham, VPF Assistant Director of HR/Payroll and Merchant Services, for overseeing the payroll process during his team’s transition to remote work. Through his dedication and exceptional effort, he made sure that MIT payroll continued to run without a hitch by streamlining processes and taking special steps to see it through. Terrific job, Chris and HR/Payroll team!
Jennifer Burke, Office of the Vice President for Finance
The clinicians in all of Medical
Thanks to every health care worker at MIT and including the Mental Health clinicians who have been on the front lines day in and day out taking care of all of the MIT community and how you make yourself available to the community for any question they may have. Thank you for the excellent care you provide, but especially in this health crisis. I pray that you stay well and safe. Thank you!
Paulette Wood, Medical
Cari Angellotti, Margie Ferreira, and the Benefits Team
We are very grateful to the Benefits team in Human Resources. Within days, Margie, Cari, and the team transitioned content for new employee orientation into a virtual format. Because of their swift action and thoughtful planning, we did not have to cancel or postpone any sessions. We are fortunate to work alongside colleagues who are so immediately responsive and supportive of our asks, to the needs of this program, and new employees -- both in the past and during these current transitions.
Megan Chester, STM, Human Resources
Christina English
Christina was amazing as we all transitioned from working in W11 and moving our "operations" to home. She was patient, kind, calm and helpful. She's always amazing and in these sad and challenging times, it was a relief to know that she would have the answers we needed or knew who we could contact. She has also begun a "drop in" Zoom room on Friday mornings so we can keep connected as suite mates.
Patricia-Maria Weinmann, ORSEL
Paula Hammond
She really showed great care and concern for the students due to the ongoing circumstances. I really appreciated the calming emails that she sent (even at midnight!) to the department community and making sure that we all can transition nicely as things are changing very fast. Thanks, Paula!
Pushkal Sharma, ChemE
CTL- MITx MicroMasters in Supply Chain Management Team
I want to thank the MITx MicroMasters in Supply Chain Management Team for their passion, dedication, and great effort to deliver a high-touch experience to the thousands of SCx online learners. During the last challenging weeks, the whole team achieved a big milestone, granting certificates to a total of 2,243 credential-holders from 115 countries. This is the best recognition of the impactful work that this team is doing!
Eva Ponce, MIT CTL - Executive Director, MITx MicroMasters in SCM
Jules Rodriguez
Jules has kept us sane during this lockdown, she has been extremely helpful to us in Baker House, and is running the whole front desk position so well. Absolutely grateful she is here and a great person to know.
Anonymous , Baker House Resident
Steve Dimond + June Milligan
I couldn't have asked for two better people than Steve & June to be in charge of Copytech during this time. Keeping us up to date with pertinent information in daily emails, and checking in with us all personally, they have led us confidently and as clearly as one can expect during this, and I cannot thank them enough for being such amazing leaders in our community. Copytech ROCKS!
Allen Veldwisch, Copytech
Steve Carlton, IS&T
Steve has been an incredible resource for VPR and RAS as we've worked to get all of our staff working remotely. He has gone above and beyond, and we really appreciate all of his assistance!!
Carol Wood, VPR
Jocelyn Heywood
I'm so thankful for Jocelyn Heywood, who is an amazing mentor, colleague, friend and neighbor.
Stacy DeBartolo, Arts at MIT
Dylan Girard
Dylan has really been an integral part in my group's success in this transition-to-online for our courses! He is knowledgeable about Zoom, clear in his delivery, and always willing to help. Thanks, Dylan!
Lena Ngor, BPS
Joanne Choi (CSAIL), Maxwell Madzar (CSAIL), and Natalie Wood (ISchO)
Thank you for ensuring that I could start my new position in time. I really appreciate your kindness and responsiveness.
Andreas Kipf, CSAIL
Dylan Girard
Dylan has been a rock for the Sloan School of Management during our transition to online teaching. He has been working incredibly hard every day to help train staff, faculty, and TAs. He constantly helps faculty and staff with troubleshooting problems, and supports our academic area department in getting all of our courses up and running on Zoom. He has been very accommodating, graceful, and immensely helpful to all in our community, whether it be to answer a direct question, create personal tutorials for the academic areas and faculty at Sloan, or helping to run Zoom practice sessions for anyone and everyone who needs it. H4 online teaching has definitely been a success thanks to the huge efforts and support by Dylan!!
Natalia Kalas, BPS Sloan School of Management
Margaret Bryant
Peggy a diligent and caring professional. She chases down (gently) every lead and makes sure that time-sensitive processes are concluded in a highly effective manner. She treats everyone as a special person and is kind in every way. Without her the rush, new postdocs in DUSP would struggle. She is simply a peach of a person.
Amy Glasmeier, DUSP
Maureen Ahern
Maureen was able to help me with a Travel Report effectively in this new virtual report. I greatly appreciated her assistance.
Pam Fradkin, Aeronautics and Astronautics
Michelle Jackson
As a mother with three young children in a household with two working parents, the stress level is certainly high these days. Michelle has gone above and beyond what is typically required of a manager. Her emotional support, open and regular communication style has allowed me to focus on what matters and effectively manage my work. Thank you Michelle for all you do!
Erin Coates, Audit Division
Cam Fox with MIT IS&T
Thanks to Cam for the ongoing support with web servers and for standing up the @2:50 website with speed and confidence. This single action has allowed for a great many people to convene daily.
Arthur Grau, MIT Center for Transportation & Logistics
Lisa Thoma
Thank you Lisa for your tireless efforts to keep the CRE staff informed and motivated during these uncertain times. I know this adds to your already busy workload - making it so that you are giving 110% everyday. I hope you remember to take time for yourself and that you enjoy your birthday today. Happy Birthday!
Cheryl Gillespie, Center for Real Estate
David V Merrill
David's always an incredible source of support, but one really cannot overstate his role in the past few weeks. He's available 24/7, extremely thoughtful about things to consider in moving classes to zoom, and always deeply human and caring for everyone he works with. Thanks David!
Daniel Freund, Operations Management, Sloan
Joe Borkowski
Joe has been so incredibly helpful and such a positive force in preparing our department to move our language classes online. He has done extra trainings, sent helpful small videos that he has created with useful tips, quickly answered any questions that we have had, and just made extraordinary efforts to help us be as prepared as possible to meet the needs of our wonderful students during this challenging transition.
Leanna Rezvani, Global Languages
Joe Borkowski
Joe has been beyond helpful in the transition to teaching remotely. In fact, without Joe, I don't know where we would be. His patience, kindness, availability and knowledge are unbelievable.
Sandra Ward, GSL
DoF IS&T Team: Mike, Claribel and Gus
Many thanks have already been expressed, and you deserve it!! Thank you for your quick responses and attention to keeping the DoF teams connected and informed.
Megan Kefalis, Dept. of Facilities Campus Construction
Fatih Basaga
He's awesome. Not only will Fatih respond to any of your computer-related or technical questions or problems, he'll also take the time to say hello and get to know you. He makes sure that your classes or courses will run smoothly, even if means he needs to say after hours or cut his lunch time short. He also remembers your birthday and gives you hand-written holiday card. I am grateful for his thoughtfulness but also for his technical skills to help us do our work.
Christine Pilcavage, Center for International Studies / MISTI
ChemE IT
Thank you to ChemE IT for helping us ALL to get set up to function remotely. We couldn't be as productive as we have been, if not for you, and with minimal to no disruptions, I might add. Thank you, Jim and John! You're the Best! :)
Physical Security/Sophie Wong and Dan Michaud
Sophie and Dan have helped me through so many issues, as we locked down our buildings, but still needed to get folks access. Our access issues are very complicated with many doors, and they always respond to our needs. They must be very tired, but they always take care of us. I look forward to thanking them in person, when we are back on campus together. Their teamwork and area have been critical to making the campus safe.
Jennifer Smith, Campus Activities Complex
Michael Foley
Mike has been a great leader during these struggling times. He continues to go in to make sure all our buildings are secure and critical things are taken care of, including our aquarium and plants. He shows his caring through humor and has been a positive force to keeping us together as a team. He steps up to the plate and helps other areas of DSL and MIT and thinks of many things that others do not. We are very luck at CAC and MIT to have him.
Jennifer Smith, Campus Activities Complex
Jhon Gonzalez
Jhon worked incredibly hard throughout the Maseeh move-out process, and has continued to go above and beyond to take care of our Maseeh community throughout this response to COVID-19. On a personal note from myself and Eric: Thank you for showing up at our door on a Saturday morning to provide us with a desk and office chair for our apartment. I did not expect such a fast response and was blown away by how helpful you and your team were with helping set us up for working remote. The ergonomic chair >>> our kitchen chairs.
Maria Hinterman (Smith), GRA Partner