Staff – Page 3

While students were away for the summer, Wesleyan’s Physical Plant staff were hard at work on new construction and renovations across campus, projects that improve the university’s ability to offer a high-quality education. “I’m incredibly proud of the team that has accomplished so much on our campus this summer. Their efforts will improve the sustainability of our campus and will benefit many future generations of Wesleyan students, faculty, and staff. I’m grateful to the entire Wesleyan community for their help in prioritizing these critical projects and for the continued flexibility during ongoing construction projects,” said Andy Tanaka '00, Senior Vice…

Kristen Cardona MPhil ’22 has always had a thirst for teaching and learning. It led her to a career as an elementary and middle school educator. It drove her to take a few classes at Wesleyan, work with the Office of Continuing Education, and attain her own Masters of Philosophy in Liberal Arts degree (with an award-winning thesis project). Now, thanks to her hard work and the encouragement of her Wesleyan colleagues, Cardona will be going on a 10-month fellowship project training teachers and teaching English in Okinawa, Japan as part of the U.S. Department of State’s 2022-23 English Language…

Enoila Shokunbi, a fifth grader at McDonough School in Middletown, knows exactly what she wants to be when she grows up. “President,” she said quickly. “But I might want to be a singer first.” Enoila explains that someone like Taylor Swift would likely get more votes for president because of her pop stardom, so that might be the route she wants to emulate. After her visit to Wesleyan University’s IDEAS Lab on July 14, Enoila might be able to add scientist to her list of career aspirations. Enoila is part of the STEM GEMS camp run by STEAM Train, a non-profit…

Last fall, while working as the lead production assistant for WesWorks, a performance featuring Wesleyan facilities staff, Erin Byrne '24 became acquainted with Victor Ignacio Rosario— a custodian at Wesleyan who is contracted through SMG. Rosario, who primarily works in Exley Science Center and the Science Library, allowed Byrne to job-shadow him and in return, Byrne gained a deep appreciation for his day-to-day responsibilities. "Victor is a vital and enthusiastic member of the Wesleyan community," Byrne said. "Especially during the pandemic, keeping communal spaces on campus clean constantly was difficult and necessary, and Victor helped me realize just how much…

Wesleyan has successfully launched a pair of online mini-courses this spring as a way for the university to further explore opportunities in online learning. The new initiative, which started the spring semester, featured two popular undergraduate courses: Living a Good Life, taught by Stephen Angle, Jennifer D’Andrea, Steven Horst, and Tushar Irani, and Black Phoenix Rising, taught by Anthony Ryan Hatch. Living a Good Life was a seven-week exploration of how philosophy and psychology teach us how to live lives of meaning and fulfillment. Black Phoenix Rising was a multimodal project that explores Black people’s practices of resisting death and…

Every year, as Wesleyan students empty their rooms at the end of the Spring semester, they fill dumpsters with usable items – everything from clothing and room décor to small appliances. “There was still more waste generated than we like,” said Hayley Berliner, temporary sustainability director. “We want to divert as much as we can.” Debbra Goh ’24 and Annie Volker ’24, both eco-facilitators for Wesleyan Sustainability, have come up with an idea on how to lessen the waste. The duo will launch WesThrift at 284 High next fall, a free store for clothing and dorm essentials located in the…

One in five women and one in 16 men experience sexual violence in college, according to recent studies. The percentages are even higher amongst women of color and the LGBTQ+ community. The frightening thing about those already disturbing numbers is that they are almost certainly not the whole story. “We know that this is one of the most underreported experiences of harm,” said Johanna DeBari, director of the Office of Support, Healing, Activism, and Prevention Education (SHAPE). DeBari and her team at SHAPE are hoping that their work during Dating Violence Awareness Month this October will help draw attention to the…

After an unusual 18 months of hybrid teaching, working remotely, and navigating university life during a pandemic, Wesleyan's faculty and staff are eager for some normalcy this fall. In this News @ Wesleyan piece, we speak to several employees about what they are most looking forward to during the fall 2021 semester. Morgan Keller became director of international student affairs on Aug. 23 after stints at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, University of California-Santa Cruz, and Clemson University. He learned of Wesleyan through his cousin, Adam Keller '14, who spoke favorably of the university during his time here as a film…

Every day the workers of Wesleyan’s facilities staff labor to keep the University going in the most fundamental ways. Their work can often be invisible but without properly ventilated performance spaces, clean laboratories, and functional classrooms, just to give a few examples, the University would grind to a halt. An upcoming multidisciplinary dance project titled “WesWorks” takes the rituals and movements of their days and creates choreography that transforms the ordinary, mundane, and skillful movements of work into a performance accompanied by live, original music and stories told in the workers’ voices. The performance will take place outdoors on Andrus…

Ninety-nine thousand and counting. That's how many times Wesleyan students, faculty, and staff have stuck, swiped, and swirled cotton swabs in their nasal cavities over the past seven months at the Wesleyan COVID-19 testing facility, with hopes for that negative result indicating no presence of SARS-CoV-2 RNA. "Implementing an effective testing program was essential to returning for in-person learning," said Associate Vice President/Dean of Students Rick Culliton, who spearheads Wesleyan's Curricular Contingency Planning Task Force (CCPTF). "Our number one priority is keeping the campus community safe. Having accurate, timely test results has been critical to identifying and containing any cases…

During the spring semester arrival period, Feb. 5–8, volunteers from Wesleyan's Campus-Community Emergency Response Team (C-CERT) assisted with welcoming students to campus, checking them in, and ensuring they had a COVID-19 test within five days of arriving on campus. Members also shoveled snow to keep paths clear and delivered students' suitcases, via an ATV, to their residences. Joe Fountain, director of athletic injury care, loaned the Athletics Department ATV to C-CERT for this purpose. Wesleyan's C-CERT group consists of staff, faculty, and student volunteers. (Photos by Olivia Drake and Roseann Sillasen) (more…)

For 19 years, Joyce Topshe took on the role of managing Wesleyan's construction services, environmental services, rental properties, and Physical Plant-Facilities. Now in her 20th year of working at Wesleyan, the associate vice president for facilities is powering through "the most challenging year of my career," she said. "As we approach the end of the fall semester during a raging pandemic, I am feeling like we almost won the World Series. My entire team has worked exhaustively to make our campus safe during the pandemic, and I am so grateful to every member of my team for staying the course…

University Making Progress on New Construction and Renovations

Love of Learning and Teaching Leads to State Department Fellowship

Middletown Students Experience IDEAS Lab

Employees, Students Honored with Peter Morgenstern-Clarren ‘03 Social Justice Awards

New Mini-Courses Explore Online Learning

New Campus Free Store Planned for Fall Semester

SHAPE Office Recognizes Violence Awareness Month with Activities

Faculty, Staff Prepare for a New Semester at Wesleyan

Wesleyan Facilities, Custodial Staff Celebrated through Performance

Staff Work Behind the Scenes to Create a Successful COVID-19 Testing Operation

C-CERT Assists with Student Arrival Period

Employees Recognized for Years of Service to Wesleyan