DELTA Celebrates Pride of the Wolfpack and Cheers for Peers Recipients
This year’s Pride of the Wolfpack and Cheers for Peers celebration looked a bit different than in years past. Instead of the usual all-DELTA in-person staff meeting, we held the first DELTA virtual awards ceremony via Zoom on May 29, 2020.
The Pride of the Wolfpack Award recognizes staff members who go above and beyond and make a special or unique contribution to their unit or university as a whole.
Complete with a slideshow with photos and excerpts from the nominations, Vice Provost Tom Miller announced the 2019 Pride of the Wolfpack Award recipients.
Todd Buker, Jiakaira Dixon, Larry Evans, Brandon Joyner, Janna Martin, Arlene Mendoza-Moran, Rebecca Sanchez, Jessie Sova and Tamara Watts were recognized for their efforts to improve DELTA’s operations and services in a variety of ways.
In addition to the Pride of the Wolfpack Award, several DELTA staff members were honored with a Cheers for Peers recognition for their outstanding contributions. The 2019 Cheers for Peers recipients include Michael Castro, Daniel Davis, Angela Hallman and Kara Marschalk.
DELTA would also like to recognize and congratulate the NC State Service Award recipients for their hard work and dedication over the years.
5 Years of Service
10 Years of Service
15 Years of Service
20 Years of Service
The following are excerpts from the award recipients’ nominations. Congratulations, all!
Pride of the Wolfpack
Todd Buker, Associate Producer 
Todd routinely demonstrates the desire, skill, and drive to push beyond what is expected of any project he is working on. Todd’s dedication to quality, innovation, and hard work are evident daily. Todd takes on the most difficult projects without hesitation and then skillfully manages the project until it is completed at the very highest level possible.
Jiakaira Dixon, Classroom Support and Learning Spaces Coordinator
Jiakaira took the lead in meeting with various entities on campus to improve processes, communications, and access to various scheduling systems required to schedule classrooms, not only at NC State but other institutions. She was instrumental in managing the database cleanup of an aging scheduling system and took the lead on the rollout of the new Scheduall system for the team. Jiakaira strives for success on everything she places her hands on, always looking for ways to streamline procedures to improve efficiency and customer service.
Larry Evans, Mediasite and MPS Security Administrator
Larry is a “go-to” person that one can rely on. Larry has helped me numerous times in the development of our Conference Room Guide without hesitation. I can’t thank him enough. Working side by side with Larry, one can experience his passion and detailed organized drive. Larry’s willingness to take on a project, at last minutes notice and take it to completion is without a doubt, selfless.
Brandon Joyner, Technology Support Technician
Brandon assumed the lead position on the multiviewer project, quickly learning the system and single-handedly built hundreds of layouts for display purposes on console monitors in CCR for the technicians. He offered and worked overtime with a keen sense of urgency to ensure that we were ready and prepared to start the Fall ’19 semester. His hard work and dedication have helped position our unit and organization as trendsetters in AN over IP in the educational setting.
Janna Martin, Executive Team Assistant
Janna has effectively worked across teams in DELTA on a multitude of projects with many different personalities across the organization. She remains patient with every single person, no matter what his/her issue or request. Janna is an outstanding employee. Her diligence in her approach to work is nothing short of amazing. She is thorough, enthusiastic and double-checks everything.
Arlene Mendonza-Moran, Lead Instructional Technologist
Arlene is always thinking of faculty and student success. Arlene has been heavily involved in DELTA’s Quality Matters initiatives. Arlene provides excellent mentorship to faculty in OCIP and has provided valuable input to program leads on how to improve the quality assurance services DELTA offers. Arlene was a key player in the WolfWare WordPress implementation and more recently, she helped bring HSP functionality to Moodle. She is a friendly and fun person to work with, and generous with her help in times of calm and crisis!
Rebecca Sanchez, Lead Instructional Designer
Rebecca’s contributions to the new course quality initiative is a large part of why the Course Quality Initiative was able to fledge into a full program. She has also taken the lead in research and evaluation of the program which is a massive and complex undertaking. Rebecca’s expertise in research is an invaluable asset to the team.
Jessie Sova, Assistant Vice Provost of Business Operations
Jessie makes sure that she understands where DELTA’s money is coming from, our financial challenges and opportunities, and comes up with creative (and legal) ideas on how to manage our funds to meet future needs and manage the tactical things in front of us. Most recently, Jessie has been asked to help take a closer look at the McKimmon Center finances in order to help that organization develop better business practices, processes and policy. This has not been an easy task due to the magnitude and complexity of McKimmon’s business operations. She has accepted this major responsibility on top of all of her many DELTA responsibilities because she cares that business processes are transparent, standardized, and can stand up to any audit.
Tamara Watts, Online and Distance Education Administrative Specialist
Tamara has frequently been called upon to assist with additional duties beyond her assigned workload. Tamara’s vast areas of expertise and knowledge and her dedication to serving when needed were much needed at a crucial time in ODE. Her willingness to step up and assume additional responsibilities was hugely beneficial for our DE Admin unit and DELTA, encouraging and supporting DELTA’s positive relationships across campus.
Cheers for Peers
Michael Castro, Associate Producer
Michael has many roles within DELTA IMP. He is responsible for technical innovation and implementation, he is the Media Asset Manager responsible for all digital assets the unit generates, he is the senior cinematographer, and he is the senior finishing editor (working on technically complex footage such as coloring, motion tracking, and other tools that bring all of IMP work to a very polished and professional look). His contributions to innovation and improvement in DELTA are in evidence in virtually every video IMP creates and throughout the IMP facility. On the video creation side, Michael has shot virtually every award-winning video IMP has produced in the last six years. Michael is a model employee. He is honest, hard-working, innovative, and is eager to learn and improve.
Daniel Davis, Associate Director of Instructional Design and Development
Daniel truly cares about his team both personally and professionally. He recognizes that a more cohesive team means better communication, better relationships, and better knowledge sharing that improves our projects and individual growth. He has supported the creation and growth of the Course Quality Initiative, which now includes multiple people from the ID team and from the instructional technology training (ITT) team. The Rapid Design grant process again leverages not only the skills and time of the ID team, but also the ITT and ITS teams. Daniel is mindful of doing all things with integrity. He’s interested and empathetic with the personal lives of his colleagues. He selflessly promotes and advocates for his staff and their accomplishments while downplaying his own.
Angela Hallman, Human Resources Consultant
Angela not only had to take on our vacant Accountant’s duties but also find time to do her own job duties. With Jessie being gone during most of this time on vacation, she was also the primary person for REPORTER, requiring her to quickly become familiar with the payment and refund processes of this enterprise application. She performed her work and that of two others in an exemplary manner. She was simply amazing, juggling all things business, finance, and REPORTER services single-handedly!
Kara Marschalk, Assistant Director of DELTA Testing Services
Kara has an amazing way of working with the students to make sure they can take their tests in a comfortable environment, but still upholding our standard for academic integrity. Kara is an anchor for our team. She has a real eye for detail and organization that has helped keep us efficiently and consistently working each and every day. If there is a project that needs assistance, she’s there to help. If there is a problem that needs to be addressed, she’s ready to take it head-on. She juggles the duties of checking students in and monitoring cameras, working with the DRO students and our temporary employees, scheduling, training, and now attending executive meetings. She’s always available to cover hours if needed.
- Categories:
