Work Process Improvement Awards

November 2005 – Team Award

John Bonass, Sharon Dana, Kathy Gallagher of the UNIT Wildcard Office created & mailed a CD of the Wildcard program to all incoming new students.  This CD explained the whole Wildcard Program including banking and meal plans.  This process lessened the number of phone calls prior to orientation with questions about the Wildcard.  Deposits on the Wildcard made online increased dramatically which decreased the number of people standing in line at the Wildcard Office.

June 2005 – Team Award

Caryl Keet, UNIT; Barbara Romagnoli, Bursar's Office; Pan Braxton, Registrar's Office; Jim Kane, Lisa Valosky Jodi Kaelin, Mary Anne Curran, HR, the Tuition Remission Automation Team (TRAP) has made the process of registering for classes and using tuition remission easier for a great majority of employees and their dependents by bringing the whole process on line, thus eliminating paperwork , etc.  We have received many compliments from employees saying how convenient the whole process is, and how it saves the employee time and concern about meeting deadlines.

April 2005 – Team Award

Erika AllenLynch, Ric Laudenslager, Carol McMillin, Kevin O'Donnell, Joe Pilcicki, Clete Rickert, Bill Smith, & Chris Townend worked together to devise a plan for the safe disposal of computers, monitors and other equipment which is no longer serviceable or adequate.  Instead of throwing the items into the trash, departments will notify Recycling or UNIT on line that they have items to dispose.  UNIT will evaluate the items, determine if they are surplus, mark those that are with a recycling sticker and Recycling will pick up the items.  The items could be donated to organizations which can use them, sold or sent to a decommissioning facility which complies with EPA guidelines for disposal.

April 4, 2004 – Team Award

Maura Ewing from UNIT’s User Services Division and Dave Mullen from EWS Division won the April Team Work Process Improvement Award. Maura and Dave were instrumental in the creation of an on-line system whereby incoming freshmen to the College of Commerce & Finance and the College of Engineering receive their laptop computers at their homes prior to Orientation. This allows the students to familiarize themselves with the equipment before classes begin, saving the University the expense of on-campus delivery, distribution, storage and security of the machines.

April 4, 2004 - Individual

Gene Loughlin of UNIT’s EWS division received the Individual Work Process Improvement Award for April. Gene created an online system which makes Parking Registration a 'point and click' automated process. It has cut back a great deal of paper work for the Parking Office, brought a lot of convenience to students and personnel on campus. It has certainly increased the efficiency for both sides users and parking officers.

October 3, 2004 - Team Award

For their participation in creating a system whereby prospective students can submit an online form to identify their interests. When submitted, an e-mail is generated providing the students with information and web links relating to their interests. It also stores the information in Banner for future communication with these students regarding their areas of interest. This new system has produced substantial savings to the University by eliminating an outside vendor who previously supplied this service.

Facultas Award

Purpose

The Facultas Award is designed to provide public credit to those who serve the Villanova community in a particularly creative or notable way, but who may otherwise go somewhat unacknowledged.

Fall 2005

Rachel Schaller of UNIT’s IT group has won the Fall Facultas Award.  Rachel serves as Training Coordinator, handling computer workshops and one-on-one training for staff & faculty.  Rachel has worked valiantly to help the Villanova community keep up with the never-ending changes in computing technology.  Steve Fugale, CIO pointed out that Rachel is a passionate worker on behalf of the faculty & has done a wonderful job in a critical role mediating between the user community & UNIT to make possible the most effective use of technology at Villanova.   This award was presented by the Chair of the Faculty Congress, Prof. Debra Arvanites and the Facultas Award Chair, Dr. Jeffrey Johnson of the History Department January 24, 2006.

Spring 2004

Cathy Kolongowski of UNIT’s IT group has won the Spring Facultas Award. Cathy was nominated by Nursing Professor, Terri Capriotti, for her excellent support and work with Nursing faculty using WebCT. This award was presented by Facultas Award chair, Dr. Jeffrey Johnson of the History Department April 29, 2004.

Spring 2002

Marybeth Avioli

Spring 1997

Joan Lesovitz

Distinguished Service Award

Purpose

There are two annual Distinguished Service Awards. One is designed to annually recognize an individual for consistent excellence, exceptional performance and service to the University community. Through this program, outstanding performance is encouraged in all employees as they strive to win this prestigious award.

2005 - The VQI Environmental Team - Team

Ashish Desai and Rachel Schaller

The VQI Environmental Team, is a unique mix of faculty, staff and students who represent many academic departments, offices and divisions of the University. In the words of one nominator, the Environmental Team “embodies the spirit of community that is so much a part of Villanova University.”

The members are divided into subteams, each of which works towards its own set of goals relating to Green Purchasing, Campus Sustainability, Recycling, Communications, Earth Day, and Environmental Scholarship and Research.

The team was nominated for the 2005 DSA specifically for its diligent efforts that led to the adoption of the “Villanova University Environmental Sustainability Policy” in November 2004. The Sustainability Subteam prepared a draft for the policy, presented it to the VQI Council and the Vice Presidents Council, which approved it after several revisions were made. The Team also promoted and publicized the policy by means of “an attractive and compelling exhibit” in Falvey Library during the Spring 2005 semester and a display in Connelly Center. One nominator wrote “The forward looking vision of the Environmental Sustainability Policy is completely consistent with the mission of Villanova University. Along with the Green Purchasing Policy… the Environmental Sustainability Policy places Villanova University as a leading institution of higher education in recognizing its obligation for environmental responsibility and stewardship.

Several of the nominators also cited the success of this year’s Earth Day celebration. The Earth Day Subteam brought Dr. Peter Raven, a world renowned environmentalist, to campus where he gave the keynote address, met with faculty, staff and students, and participated in a forum on sustainability. In addition, the team sponsored a number of activities including exhibits by students on class projects relating to the environment, displays relating to “green issues,” and raised money for environmental education.

2004 - The Wireless Network Project Team - Team

Robin M. Allen, John L. Center, John H. Fowler, Adam M. Goldstein, William A. Henry, Sean R. McNamara, Jill Morrison, Matthew T. Morrissey, Michael J. O’Neill, Jarrod J. Pietrobone, and Alfred E. Sermons.

The Wireless Network Project Team received the DSA for a team in recognition of their "dedication and relentless effort" to install a state-of-the-art wireless network which benefits the entire community students, faculty and staff.

Originally established to roll out wireless data network access for the College of Commerce and Finance and the College of Engineering, the team also provided access at Connelly Center, Dougherty Hall, and Falvey Library which fulfilled one of the library's strategic goals.

One part of the team focused on the physical infrastructure, security and management, painstakingly completing surveys of each area before the cabling and installation of the wireless access points. Another part of the team was responsible for laptop configuration and ongoing support.

The team worked with a limited budget and a compressed time schedule to get the network operational for the Fall 2003 semester. Although the team encountered serious problems along the way with laptops and software, they were, by investing "an enormous amount of time and effort" and by their exceptional performance, able to resolve problems as they arose.

2001 - I-Payment Team - Team

Tim Ay, John Brzezicki, John Center, Marie E. Gargan, Susan Hill, Sean McNamara, and Clete Rickert.

One of Villanova's goals has been to simplify administrative procedures to save time for students, faculty and staff members. Improvements have already been made in areas such as registration for classes and distribution of grades. Up until now, however, the payment process has not been streamlined. The I-Payment team selected a relatively isolated process--when accepted students hold their place at the University with a deposit--to see if it could be streamlined by allowing incoming students to directly enter credit card information onto the I-Payment Web site. While this might seem to be a fairly simple change, it involved the creative coordination of a number of campus offices and paved the way for streamlining other processes in the future.

1999 - Electronic Reserve Task Force - Team

Daniel P. McGee

This award recognized this team's efforts to enable the electronic delivery of supplemental course-related information that had only been accessible in print and located only in the Reserve Room of Falvey Library. They worked to analyze, investigate and implement a full-text digital access reserve system. Through the efforts of this team, student can now access supplemental readings from computers in their own rooms.

1998 - UNIT Technical Support Team

Emil Kotschneff, Ken McKeown, Joseph Coffey, John Sullivan, and Kevin Toth.

The award recognizes these individuals for demonstrating consistent excellence, exceptional performance and an active sense of community in their daily interaction with more than 3,000 faculty, staff and students across the entire campus. Highlights of their contributions include their detailed planning and coordination efforts which minimized computer down-time for departments being upgraded or temporarily relocated. Their expert advice at purchase decision times and their centralized system of tracking computer hardware also reduced University operating costs.

1998 - Individual

Joan M. Lesovitz received this award for for consistent, excellent, accurate and timely performance of duties, which include providing technical and multimedia support for the development, delivery and presentation of instructional material with the primary goal of enhancing learning, and for consulting services to non-academic departments developing projects and presentations for their initiatives, among many other duties.