Award Winners

Andrew Mullen
Information Technology Professional III
CSU Health Network
As an Information Technologist, Andrew Mullen provides outstanding service with his capable supervision and administration of the CSU Health Network operating system and software infrastructure, support and integration of the electronic health records and through network security. His concern for the availability and safety of confidential information, in compliance with organizational, university, state, and federal policies and regulations. is a statement to his integrity and level of professionalism. He manages the development and implementation of new, innovative technology to improve efficiency by automating health care business processes. For example, he created the system for on-line scheduling of appointments and emailing of immunization records, as well as the automatic reminders about appointments sent by text or email. Andrew was an indispensable leader through the integration of Hartshorn Health Service and the University Counseling Center into the CSU Health Network. Andrew worked tirelessly with the student health insurance program to move all their processing from paper to electronic documents. When, as part of the Affordable Care Act, an insurance mandate for CSU students was implemented in 2014, Andrew played a key role in developing and implementing the student health insurance eligibility and billing tools and processes supporting more than 4,500 students and their insurance claims each term. He created technology to track waiver requests and automatically send approval and denial emails in a timely way to students. Andrew is always looking for ways to refine information and make the data more useful. He has always risen to the occasion to create and streamline ways of tracking compliance, with the health and well-being of CSU students his first and foremost concern.

John Parry
Director
CSU Bookstore
Since 1999, John Parry, Director of the Colorado State University Bookstore, has been a very integral part of “School Is Cool,” (SIC) a CSU community outreach program. John networks and builds relationships on behalf of SIC to identify potential vendor donations and secure donations, such as backpacks, binders, folders, notebooks, and special pricing opportunities to help stretch dollars further an assist more children in the community. Through his keen and innovative connections, it is estimated SIC has saved an average of $10,000 each year, and over 15 years, this results in a savings of more than $150,000. He empowers and engages his staff, other campus units and offices, and the community to be a part of the program and to embrace its mission. For instance, he recruits and leads a team of volunteers (CSU employees and Senior Scholars, community members, high school and church groups) to donate their resources and their time to ensure that the process is productive, positive, and efficiently run. As a result of these efforts, more than 32,000 less-fortunate faces have been provided the opportunity for academic success and the advocacy to ensure education equality and success. John recognizes how closely SIC aligns with the University’s mission and as a result, works tirelessly to ensure the money donated to the program is managed in an effective and responsible manner. Because of his commitments to SIC and the many other programs he supports and champions (CSU Athletics, Cans Around the Oval, student organizations, community fundraisers, etc.), the CSU Bookstore is recognized as one of the University’s strongest brand illustrators and ambassadors and an integral part of the Fort Collins community. People depend on John and the CSU Bookstore to enhance the university’s relationship with the local community and future generations of Ram families.

Evelyn Swiss
Senior Institutional Research Board Coordinator
Research Integrity & Compliance Review Office
Evelyn has been an Administrative Professional at CSU since 1998 and the common theme of her professional career is service to students. In 2005, she joined the Research Integrity & Compliance Review Office (RICRO). RICRO facilitates faculty oversight of the ethical components of research, including human subjects, animal subjects and infectious agents. Many students must submit Institutional Review Board (IRB) “protocols” to perform human subject research. Originally, IRB processes were tracked through paperwork, however, Evelyn has played a critical role in the design and implementation of online and electronic support services. She worked patiently, even when under extreme fire, to move the process of the IRB, a faculty committee overseeing human subject research, to a completely web-based system. This new process improves the lives of the faculty and students who complete human subject research, as well as the CSU faculty and non-CSU community members who represent the IRB. It also enhances the accuracy and compliance of the work, ensuring that CSU maintains the highest ethical standards. Evelyn also led the complete reinvention of the IRB websites and, in one month, the website had 2,442 web “sessions,” from 1,320 individual users, entailing 6,300 page views. She has been the solo architect of the RICRO social media campaign to ensure maximal connectivity with CSU and external/community partners. She developed numerous tip sheets, FAQs, and help worksheets to provide information to faculty and students. Evelyn also deserves much of the credit for establishing and maintaining the office ambience for the past ten years. She views office operations in a holistic manner and as a result of her nurturing, RICRO has enviable retention rates. She continues to work with students, providing them with the training to succeed, with mentoring to help them become accomplished in their academic studies, and with nurturing to help them survive college.

David Warner
Research Associate IV
Department of Physics
For over twenty years, the faculty in the Department of Physics have depended on Dave’s inventiveness. He has made essential contributions to frontier science all over the world. He contributed to the design and construction of experiments in eight (8) countries, producing hundreds of peer-reviewed publications in internationally recognized journals. In these projects he has contributed from initial concepts to engineering design and construction to installation and finally to repairs years later when most technical staff have long since abandoned projects. For instance, the Pierre Auger observatory is a project in Argentina with over 1,600 individual 3,000-gallon tanks of water used with sensitive light detectors to record passage of particles entering the atmosphere from outer space. Working with a vendor in California, Dave developed and constructed custom plastic laminate material liners to hold the water inside the tanks and provide a watertight window for the light detectors. The water must remain clear for 20 years and, now, more than 15 years later it still is clear. Dave invented a new way to weld the materials providing a very strong seam that had been impossible using existing methods. He trained workers at a collaborating Argentine university and exported the welding machines, techniques, and laminate material to Argentina. This saved the international collaboration, including institutions in 17 countries, significant costs.

Dave has been extraordinarily successful building and managing a wide variety of teams required to execute the projects brought to him by research faculty over many years. Depending on the project needs and budget, he has used a combination of undergraduates, graduate students, technicians, temp agency help, post-doctoral researchers. He leads by example through his work ethic and dedication. He wants the project to succeed but also wants people to succeed. Mentoring and treating people as individuals is just part of Dave’s DNA.