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Adam Zaby, Del De La Cruz, Cheri Bratton, Josh Cox, Veronica Rodriguez, & Eddie Lopez, UTSA Libraries

When students began seeking ways to return library books, this team from the UTSA Libraries was instrumental in developing and executing a plan for students to do so safely at the JPL. From coordinating with UTSA Police and Occupational Health to creating signage and external messaging, the team went above and beyond to ensure a seamless result to meet the needs of students, faculty and staff.

Alan Galvez, Student Activities

Alan quickly adapted the annual training sessions for student organizations to re-register from an in-person format to an online webinar format. He hosted 10 sessions over 2 weeks and saw almost 300 students participate overall. The sessions were well received and delivered in a way in which students were able to still engage with the information as well as Alan as the presenter.

Alessandra Sanchez, Campus Recreation

Prior to the Rec (RWC) closure, Alexandra begin planning for remote fitness classes. She first work with her staff to create live classes. With Zoom bombing being a thing, she quickly without hesitation switch to recorded classed for IGTV. Once Zoom classes were made safe, live classes were relaunched (4/16). The next step is utilizing TikTok. She also created a fitness workout for Staff Senate.

Amanda Garcia, Advising Administration

Entry 1: In the process of getting ready to telecommute, Amanda, has been a Godsend. Her support continued as we got home & things did not function as planned. She suggested doing "mock" student appointments with her to ensure that we'd be functioning properly when we saw our real students. Big issues or small, Amanda ALWAYS said to contact her if we were struggling through a process where she could help.

Entry 2: Amanda goes above and beyond to help advisors and administrative support staff with technology issues during this challenging phase. She can easily be reached and almost immediately offers creative solutions. As a consequence, our advising service for students is rarely impacted. While helping, she is very patient, calming down anxious staff members Thank you Amanda for being so awesome and kind!

Entry 3: Amanda has done an amazing job helping the academic advisors transition to telecommuting. She responds quickly & always provides a positive, solution oriented approach. She is patient, knowledgeable, & an invaluable support to advisors. She has helped one on one, walking them through, as they develop new skills to help our students remotely. Amanda has risen to the challenge of this stressful time

Amy Ossola-Phillips, Research Service Center for Sciences & Engineering

As director of the RSC-Sciences & Engineering, Amy has been a strong leader during this time, keeping us informed and maintaining a positive attitude to keep staff morale high. Amy holds our weekly team meetings on Friday mornings through Microsoft TEAMS and started a group chat for the whole office that continues every day. She also coordinated a surprise birthday meeting for one of our staff.

Amy Ossola-Phillips, Mary Riedel, Christene Donithan, Jennifer Latta, Andrew Roybal, Reynaldo Coronado, Linda De La Cruz, Cedric Williams, Erika Sullivan, Josephine Melendez, Research Service Center for Sciences and Engineering

When we transitioned to remote work, some team members went to each other's houses to make sure that the work stations were set-up and ready to go. With the new online format, we quickly transitioned our processes to continue our service to the faculty, staff and students we serve. We reached out to faculty and discussed ways we could accommodate their new environments.

Angelika Roacha, RSC-DT

Angelika was very sketchy about getting setup at home because she didn't have the technology support at home, like we do at work. Even through all that, she has been working at 120%, and still getting research proposals submitted on time and working with the rest of our RSC team, to keep workflow moving, as if there was never an interruption. I feel the faculty we work with, also see that as well.

Ariel Patton, Counseling & Mental Health Services

Being one of our newest team members, Ariel lends her enthusiastic spirit to everyone. She assisted in getting clinicians set up to providing services remotely, as she took initiative to assist our lead on this task. She has also embarked on expanding services to students by starting a new online support group aimed at providing support for survivors.

Brian L. Hogan, Department of Computer Science

1. Provide oversight and administrative responsibility in the implementation and operation of projects or activities to the Computer Science department. 2. Maintains the department and non department servers. 3.Architects system designs to improve performance and reduce marginal operating costs for a growing student enrollment 4.Teaching his employees grow and learn.

Bryant Silbaugh, Kathy Ewoldt, SPED

Dr. Ewoldt has quickly adapted our IRB proposal and intervention to allow research to continue and provide support to elementary students with disabilities who are adapting to online ed.This is allowing me personally to continue progress with my program.Dr. Silbaugh has invented and introduced a revolutionary, affordable solution to the problem of social distancing within 2 wks of the quarantine.

Business Information Services Team, BIS office within VPBA division

BIS was the 1st dept at UTSA to be deployed to work at home back in Aug-2018. We assisted those deployed due to COVID-19 by: (1) Provide training to VPBA teams who needed assistance with tools needed like DUO, VPN and MS TEAMS (2) Provided extra hours and weekend support during deployment (3) Provided communication on use of SharePoint timekeeping in lieu of paper (4) COVID-19 issue tracking

Charlin Jones-Chavez, Student Activities

Dr. Jones-Chavez worked to help establish a virtual front desk for our department. She has helped other departments and programs deliver content. She has had to work creatively with others to deliver a virtual commencement experience for our graduates as well. This has meant countless additional meetings. She helped create online sessions for all student organizations.

Chris Crenshaw, Student Placement Advising

Chris selflessly helped not only his own office, Student Placement, but actually went and met with other advising staff in other offices to help them prepare for the transition to telecommuting. His technical and organizational knowledge and skills built up the confidence and ability of his team.

Christene Donithan, Research Service Center for Sciences and Engineering

Christene went out of her way and went over to her team member's house to assist her with setting up her work station for remote work. Christene is innovative in ways that she can continue her service to faculty that we serve as well as her team members. She is always available and willing to help!

Claudia Arcolin, Digital Learning

Entry 1: Dr. Arcolin was the driving force behind shifting spring courses to online. Her creativity, leadership and dedication to this endeavor is unparalleled. She spent many, many hours working on an overall plan using the resources we already have in place, answering faculty and staff questions at all hours, and ensuring the implementation of all training and resources went smoothly.

Entry 2: Claudia's can-do attitude and expertise were key to help coordinate Academic Innovation webinars and Q&A sessions for each college for the Rapid Response Teaching strategies. Her dedication to her team, and commitment to ensure faculty were comfortable with the technology and pedagogy to teach online was inspiring and really shined on across different areas! She is a remarkable leader!

Clyde Phelix, Biology Department

He is our department champion. We have threads of different topics that he started so we can all communicate through Teams. He posts even in the late evening. Dr. Phelix has been so involved in making sure we transition to remote instruction in an exceptional matter. He does his research on new apps and tips and tricks to the current ones we use. He gives examples on how to handle 100+ student cla

Dianna Olukotun, Quy Fung, Natalie Metzger, Alex Santillan, Cynthia Galindo, Rich Garza, Israel Falcon, Keith Slater, Luke Salazar, Laboratory Safety and Hazardous Materials Management, Office of Research Integrity, VPREDKE

The Laboratory Safety and Hazardous Materials Management Team continued to work throughout the shutdown to ensure that critical research could continue on campus safely. They were instrumental in coordinating donations of hand sanitizer and supplies to UTHealth at the start of the outbreak. They all consistently think and work creatively and positively to make research on campus safe.

Diana Pirhala; Lisa Chavez; Jo Ann Jones, Education Leadership & Policy Studies

I can't speak highly enough about the ELPS administrative staff. They have collaborated to ensure the faculty continue to be supported, that the department transition seamlessly to the remote work setting, and have continued to be responsive to our questions and needs. They have thought of everything-even things I would've never thought of (e.g., mail). We are incredibly fortunate to have them.

Edda Wallace, Presidential Communications & Special Projects

Edda is the perfect example of adaptability and grace under uncertain and ever-changing circumstances. She has completely adjusted her event planning skills and has been instrumental in the coordination and transition of UTSA's in-person events to new creative virtual formats, including Town Halls and Community Conversations. In hard times,Edda has done all she can to keep UTSA a connected family.

Eric Weber, Dept of Public Safety

Sgt Weber spent days helping many members of the Dept. figure out and find all the equipment needed to work from home. He spent two days driving around SA looking for WFH computer supplies. He's created TEAMS to keep our group informed, taught TEAMS to numerous people, created new spreadsheets to track our time, created new Dept. wide accessible folders to hold all pertinent COVID info.

Erika Sullivan, RSC for Sciences and Engineering

Erika joined our UTSA team not long before we went to remote work. Though still in training, Erika easily transitioned to remote work and has continued provide great support to the faculty that we serve. Erika is attentive, consistent, and always available when assistance is needed.

Ernest Hernandez, Gerard Bustos, & James Borrego, Video Production

Entry 1: Ernest & his amazing team have jumped into action during the transition to keep the University connected through video technology support. They have researched, tested, and mainstreamed the University's Town Hall format that has provided vital information and resources to the entire UTSA community, and are now also involved in external communication efforts through Community Conversations.

Entry 2: To transition to a virtual work world, Video Production has been instrumental in providing the capability to still keep in touch, to provide valuable information for all members of the university community, and to foster the spirit of communication and collaboration even in difficult times.

Felix Almanza, Biology Department

Felix prepared the fiscal team in the department for the work from home process. Felix reached out to Quickbooks and purchased remote access to ensure the fiscal team had access to our department fiscal files. He has reported on behalf of the department for every inquiry regarding all fiscal matters in the department. He is outstanding in his contributions to the department.

Georgina Anguiano Elliott, Veronica Longoria, Sheryl Robisheaux, Karen Garcia, Pamala Howard, Melanie Vigil, and Cassandra Flores, Human Resources-Benefits & Leave Administration

The Benefits and Leave Administration Team has worked tirelessly on several projects during this remote time. They are focused on the Virtual Benefits Fair for Annual Enrollment, training and supporting employees with the new ESS/MSS timesheet process, assisting employees with the FFCRA during the pandemic, and partnering with Staff Senate to develop the Roadrunner Staff Emergency Fund.

Gilbert Lopez Jr. , Counseling & Mental Health Services

Gilbert has been instrumental in implementing the transition from our in-person services to tele-therapy services. He did the research and proving trainings to staff on how we would utilize the TAO platform to conduct tele-therapy services, and has been a strong support for staff as they transitioned to implement a new service remotely.

Guy Walsh, NSCC

During the COVID-19 pandemic, a lot of misinformation has spread through social media and other sites. This isn't always malicious, but there have been cases of that too. Additionally, numerous fake URL's have been set up to lure individuals in so attackers can then obtain personal information. Gen. Walsh created the COVID-19 task Force to create a site for anybody to get real updates.

Iselda Rodriguez, Student Activities

Developed protocols for virtual front desk. Developed financial processes for student organizations in remote setting. Supervises a student pool in a distance setting and helped them work through distance concerns. She greets each day with a smile and a What Can I Do To Help Attitude.

Jan McKinney, Sr. Vice Provost for Student Affairs

Entry 1: Jan McKinney has worked with all Student Affairs departments to support all the work being done in this new remote environment. Providing options of platforms and technology. Assisting with these technological platforms, helping to solve issues that arise with poise and creativity. Leading the charge with thoughtful guidance and practical options. All while finishing her dissertation.

Entry 2: Brought teams together to deliver messaging, strategies, and online content. Works to help others' success in this new environment. Prepared multiple Town Hall Meetings to help others and prepared panels. Continuously brings teams together to ensure progress towards mission and goals. Hard to think about a team when something needs to get done that Jan is not mentioned and/or involved.

Jarvis Clark, Student Activities

When we were sent home my concern was figuring out how to work from home with my 2yo who is high risk. Jarvis has gone above and beyond as a supervisor, with 4 kids of his own at home, he allowed me to adjust my schedule, listens to me cry & has come up with innovative ways to connect with students. He is supportive/pushes creativity as we look to fall & allows us to stretch our minds with no fear.

Jennifer Latta, Research Service Center for Sciences and Engineering

Jenn transitioned to remote work seamlessly. She continued to provide excellent customer service to those we serve. She was the first to volunteer to check our mail at campus for the team. Jenn is constantly finding ways to make work easier during this remote phase. She is an incredible asset to our team.

Jerry González, UTSA Mexico Center / Dept. of History

Dr. González has made sure to appropriate funds from our Mellon grant for staff and our undergraduate fellows through the telecommuting period, as well as creatively reorienting the Fellowship to an entirely digital format, ensuring both office staff and the students we serve are taken care. He's also directed staff to keep up to date on local resources for our students experiencing hardship.

Jessica Hodgson, Human Resources

Entry 1: Jessica runs the employee wellness program. When telecommuting began she saw a need to keep employees connected and engaged. She built a Teams group (Rowdy New U) with over 100 members specifically for health & wellness topics. The Team offers virtual yoga, stretch breaks, meditation, and fitness events. It also allows members to connect virtually by posting pictures, chatting, and encouragement.

Entry 2: Jessica created a public Rowdy New U Team which includes resources, videos, and weekly incentives to stay active while working at home. She has implemented several methods of open communication for the UTSA community and showed creativity in methods for promoting group activity even when working in isolation. Her focus on community-building and no-equipment activity has enabled wellness continuity

John McGee, Department of Construction Science

John has been critical to the academic continuity, as he is the only administrative support of the Department of Construction Science. John has communicated effectively and continuously with everybody in the department and at the university. John as provided and implemented great ideas such as: on-line forms important for our students to register for classes, change majors and be admitted.

John Shaffer, Graduate School

As Chair of Staff Senate, John has worked with offices across campus to continue providing personal and professional development opportunities to the campus community. He ensured planned trainings were moved online and helped create additional trainings and town hall events. He created a Staff Senate YouTube channel and helped establish the Remote Resources page on the Staff Senate website.

Jolyn Demarest, Human Resources

Jolyn is the Occupational Health Nurse for UTSA. She has gone above and beyond to provide medical advice, resources, and comfort to those employees contacting her about possible COVID-19 infections or exposures. She has provided training for employees using respirators to disinfect potentially contaminated areas. Daily she is on the front line of employees responding to the COVID-19 crisis.

Josephine Melendez, RSC for Sciences and Engineering

Josephine joined our UTSA team right before we transitioned to remote work. Josephine was aware of the services that needed to continue through remote work and was quick to provide her own personal equipment to keep our services going. She remains attentive and ensures that excellent services are provided to those that we serve.

Kirsten Spooner, Volunteer Services

Kirsten had to modify UTSA's Day of Service to a Month of Virtual Service upon her return from an Alternative Break Experiential Learning Trip. Her quick thinking, networking, and commitment to active citizenship has been phenomenal. She continues to collaborate with student organizations, departments, colleges, and community partners to accomplish this month of Service. #BirdswhoServe

Kristina "Tina" Garza, Strategic Enrollment Marketing and Communication

Tina and the Salesforce CRM team (Douglas Baker, Marvin Lopez and Anthony Bright) have gone way above and beyond to support our move to remote work. Because of them, we implemented Live Chats with students for One Stop and Veteran & Military Affairs so we could assist students while the Jabber phone system was still being installed. We COULD NOT have functioned without them!

Laura Sheehy, COB Faculty Development Specialist

Laura Sheehy (and Rita Mitra) provide endless mentoring, tutoring, and direct assistance for COB faculty in transitioning their courses online. They provided tutorials for every department in the college, held endless 'office hours' to help faculty as they were working feverishly during spring break and the week after. They worked overtime at all hours of the night and weekends.

Lauren Beaver, Business Affairs

Lauren has been instrumental in managing all aspects of the communication activities for the Business Affairs division. Throughout this process, she has been extremely responsive to the need for communicating changes to business processes, often with very short and strict timelines. She is no stranger to working at all hours of the day and weekends. Her skills and talents are greatly appreciated.

Leslie Sanchez, College of Engineering Dean's Office

Leslie has gone above and beyond to continue to help our college family. She assisted with getting the faculty technology they need. She has helped our students by being the virtual front door of the dean's office in answering their questions. Our office does not run in a "normal" environment without her. She continues to provide excellent service to all during this unprecedented time.

Dr. Lorenzo D. Sanchez, Mr. Cory Garcia, Mrs. Elizabeth Rodriguez-Santo, Mrs. Adelaida Torres, Office of Risk & Emergency Management

Cory, Elizabeth, Adelaida, and Dr. Sanchez have been instrumental in coordinating the university-wide planning strategy to transition staff/faculty to telecommuting, as well as supportin faculty through the development of academic continuity plans, both at the college-level and in the classroom. The OREM team also ensured that on-campus essential workers have the correct masks/PPE to work safely.

Marcela Ramirez, Claudia Arcolin, Jonathan Gutierrez, Kevin Williams, Vanessa Garza, Mayra Collins, Elyse Ramirez, Michael Brand, Jatin Bhavsar, RaLynn McGuire, Willie Schaeffer, Diana Amis, Office of Digital Learning

This team has banded together and helped instructors go from face-to-face classes to online. This team is very dedicated to promoting online learning for all. They have huge hearts and I am honored to be working with them and to consider them Familia and Ohana. They are the best team ever to work with and for.

Mary Alice Morizen , Biology Department

In learning that staff would be working remotely, Mary Alice showed all of the department how to upload and use TEAMS. She set up folders in TEAMS to assist our PhD students in making requests to continue to move their processes forward. She set up mock sessions via TEAMS, WebEx and Zoom to prepare our students for qualifying exams, dissertations and thesis defense. She calmed a lot of fears.

Melissa Perez & Vanessa Ramos, Library Interlibrary Loan

They have managed to complete an overwhelming number of interlibrary loan requests for our students and our faculty who have suddenly been cut off from a physical library. Many of our students rely heavily on our print collection and print course reserves. Without being able to physically enter our building to scan items, Vanessa and Melissa have been endlessly patient and innovative.

Melissa Platt, Office of Strategic Enrollment - Administration

Melissa has played a primary role in leading the Strategic Enrollment admin team during our telecommuting transition due to the COVID-19 crisis. Though we are a large team, she looks out for each and every one of us, provides helpful resources, answers all staff questions, arranges meetings so we can all stay on the same page, provides reassurance, and radiates positivity in every situation.

Melissa Rodriguez, Registrar

Shout out to Melissa Rodriguez for continuously meeting university leadership, staff, and student needs at the drop of a hat! Working remotely has had a large impact on this office and Melissa has been crucial. With everything constantly changing to meet student needs, Melissa's ability to quickly and effectively think outside the box and anticipate department needs has been crucial.

Mia Wright, College of Sciences - Biology

As a Microbiology Lab TA in Spring 2020, the pandemic couldn't stop me from aiding the future professionals of UTSA. I tutored, teached, quizzed and mediated in person labs prior to quarantine in Texas. I continued working and held online office hours after researching and proposing the use of the "Remind" app. The idea was approved for going above and beyond by the UTSA Microbio Lab Supervisors.

Michael Edwards & Courtney Clevenger, University Communications

Michael: manages UTSA Today, compiles email content for University Updates (originally daily, now M/W/F), manages part of the UTSA storytelling team Courtney: manages UTSA's public affairs team, responds to media inquiries, ensures maximum placement of UTSA stories; pitches experts to media for COVID stories Michael & Courtney have been instrumental in telling the UTSA story during COVID.

Mitzi Shipley, University Marketing

Mitzi has been able to remotely manage a staff of 3 and produce exceptional work from her group. Videos, graphics, emails, website designs are all part of her day to day, and she's been able to do great work from home while keeping her team productive.

Monica Carreon, College of Sciences, Office of the Dean

Monica has been a true team-player. She has worked hard to make the transition to remote working easier for others, taking the time to learn new systems so that she can instruct colleagues and helping the Dean's Office team troubleshoot technology issues and brainstorm solutions.

Rafael, Laboratory Animal Resource Center

The LARC is absolutely essential front line workers for UTSA. They are sacrificing for the team by developing new methods to aid with social distancing while maintaining essential research assets. They are taking on more, but essential work and risk. Rafa, is an especially great leader on the ground. He is good to his people, gets the job done, and maintains communication with researchers.

Rey Villanueva, Teaching Learning Services

Rey Villanueva has been extremely proactive and beyond helpful during this time of transition. He has been providing one-on-one sessions with instructors in our department to make sure everyone feels comfortable teaching from home, while having the necessary skills to do so successfully. He has been teaching and helping me as well, I have been able to easily transition fully on-line thanks to him

Rita Mitra, Director of Online Programs - College of Busines

Rita has gone above and beyond supporting faculty with the move to all courses online at all hours of the day, 7 days a week. She has been available to answer questions (email, phone, zoom), provide guidance, or directly assist faculty with work in their courses while maintaining her own courses. She directly impacts UTSA's goal to ensure students' academic success while improving faculty sanity.

Rocky, Computer Science

Dr. Rocky Slavin has stood up to help the office publish critical information related to COVID-19 and its impact on the current semester, a task he performs because he had previously volunteered to help update our department's aging web site. Beyond his teaching duties as a Professor of Practice, Dr. Slavin is applying for several grants during this period, and has brought together a team to serve

Roz Peña Wilkins, Jenna Gonzales, Drew Morehead, Richard Rodriguez, John Heiden, Guy Walsh, National Security Collaboration Center

1. Physical to Virtual Collaboration Day events. 2. Adding NSCC Partners despite the remote challenges. 3. Key partner in formation of UTSA’s Covid 19recoveryTexas.org websites 4. Hosting Grant education video conferences. 5. Created visual identity ‘icons’ that help identify NSCC team members within large attended Webex conferences. 6. Increased research funding opportunities for faculty researchers. 7. Getting the NSCC’s Webex setup working before the transition off campus telework. 8. Implemented Covid19 Cyber Task Force weekly collaboration meetings with stakeholders from gov., industry, and academia (researchers). 9. Quickly established communication with NSCC Partners to facilitate missions.

Scott Dove, OIT / Tech Cafe

Even though there have been many personnel helping me set up my system to work from home, Scott was a very integral part in my success. He worked endlessly to set up my laptop, camera, printer, headset, and microphone. All these items required my laptop to have multiple updates done. He fixed all my issues with the technology so that I could be successful working from home.

Shannon Marquess, Human Resources

Since mid-April through mid-May, Shannon has managed the distribution of face-coverings for all essential employees at UTSA. She meets them on campus and trains them on proper use of the face-coverings. She also takes time to see how they are doing personally and professionally. Shannon and her team always extends that extra hand to make sure their colleagues are safe and well during this time.

Shantae Wright , Biology Department

Shantae provides administration for our master's students. She has worked alongside of our programs GAR and has successfully assisted our students in navigating to complete their comp exams, directed research or thesis research. She set-up the platforms and conducted mock exercises to prepare our students. Faculty have communicated their gratitude for her outstanding service to our students.

Shashi Pinheiro, Marketing and Communications

Upon being made of a technical issue with our Commencement site vendor, Shashi worked several hours behind the scenes to correct the situation so the graduates would have a good experience. He kept an incredible sense of humor while assisting and was willing to go above and beyond. He also worked to set up the platform initially.

Shelley Howell, Teaching and Learning Center

Shelley Howell has gone above and beyond helping us transition smoothly into online teaching pretty much overnight during the COVID 19. She has been available 24/7. She is caring and passionate about students and faculty, and extremely supportive at all times. Shelley is truly devoted to the the best teaching-learning experience. She is the best candidate for this award.

Stacy Speedlin, Sarabia Family Counseling Center

Stacy Speedlin directs the Sarabia Family Counseling Center (SFCC). The SFCC provides pro-bono services to individuals and families in San Antonio. In response to COVD-19, Dr. Speedlin seemlessly facilitated the transition of the entire clinic to telemental health services, including technical and professional ethics training. Impressively, with almost no disruption to student and clients services

Dr. Steve Wilkerson, Dr. Lauren Apgar, Dr. Jinny Case, Salma Ferdous, Brian Cordeau, Doug Atkinson, Leanne Charlton, Shanna Sherwood, Peter Nguyen, Dr. Fikre Bitew, Dr. Mahmoud Abunawas, Art Pagano, Ashwin Jayagopal, Linda Starnes, Institutional Research & Analysis

Institutional Research & Analysis = TEAMWORK. IRA has managed to pivot from working on campus to working remotely seamlessly & effectively while remaining connected as a TEAM. IRA continues to provide a substantial increase in data & analysis for our campus community which helps UTSA weather COVID-19 issues & supports students, faculty & staff in the shift of future course delivery, etc.

Strategic Enrollment Team under Joseph Kulhanek, Strategic Enrollment Partnerships

The Strategic Enrollment Teams has collaborated and pivoted to offer virtual information sessions for incoming Freshman, Transfer and International Students. They successfully hosted UTSA Day, usually a big on campus visit day, to offer a virtual visit day with over 2000 guests. They continue to provide customer service by offering 1 to 1 appointments with students. Orientation is fully online.

Tara Schmidt , Library

Tara has offered her time to help anyone struggling within online instruction and resources. She has also voiced her concern for students and the public to have specific access to useful and beneficial resources for health, education, mental health and well being, and more. Tara remains consistent in her efforts to help everyone, with colleagues and students always at the forefront.

TechCafe Staff, UTS-TechCafe

The TechCafe staff's combined efforts to assisted with issuing UTSA loaner laptops to students, faculty, and staff who lack those technical resources. They also work daily to ensure that calls, emails, social media contact requests from the UTSA community for software and hardware issues are addressed or routed to appropriate resources to ensure academic success.

The UTSA Small Business Development Center, The UTSA Small Business Development Center

The UTSA SBDC's approach to transitioning into a remote work environment has been phenomenal. The SBDC staff worked diligently with OIT to ensure all phone lines and equipment worked remotely. Since our program helps the local small business community, we anticipated many calls and emails from existing clients and new ones concerned about their businesses & wanted them to know we are here to help.

Tomas Rivera Center , Tomas Rivera Center

The Tomas Rivera Center for Student Success provides academic support programs for UTSA undergraduate students. For the AY 18-19, the TRC served close to 18,000 individual students. The TRC provides Tutoring, Supplemental Instruction, Academic Success Coaching, Academic Peer Coaches at the residential halls, and the ACE program/TRC DT. The TRC moved all services virtually creatively for students

UTSA PD Commencement Drive Patrol-Corporal Ed Gonzales, Corporal Chris Charo, Corporal Rochelle Evans, Officer Mark Smith, Officer Rob Canull, Officer Robert Rigney, Officer Chris Villarreal, Officer Joseph Wilson, Officer Lonnie Baker, Lieutenant Shawn Smith #640, UTSA PD

The Police Department Patrol worked the inaugural, quite successful, Commencement Drive. The event allowed graduates to parade in cars and honk and make a "final drive" to celebrate their Commencement. It was safe, socially distant, and yet personal & well received. It is sure to become an annual tradition; the idea is sustainable beyond current restrictions. The PD was vital to its success!

Victor Smith, Research, Economic Development and Knowledge Enterprise

Entry 1: Victor has been integral in transition of REDKE staff to a successful telecommuting workforce. Fondly known as the ‘go-to-person’ for most things related to IT at REDKE, Victor received many calls and emails daily from throughout the university, faculty and staff who call upon his experience and know-how for general IT(research) questions and advice. Victor performed above and beyond.

Entry 2: victor went above and beyond making sure everyone in the entire vice president for research, economic development, knowledge enterprise division had what they would need to work remotely. He took time to educate people on how to set up at home and stepped in whenever UTS wasn't quickly available. These are not his normal tasks but he happily provided service to help ease everyone's stress.

Entry 3: Victor continues to go above and beyond to help all colleagues across REDKE to the best of his ability. He effortlessly pivots to tasks asked of him while always seeming to have enough time for questions, topics of discussion, and additional ways to enhance systems/procedures. The remote transition was made easier for everyone because of his willingness to provide exceptional guidance and help.

Virtual Commencement Team-Anne Peters, Brett Calvert, Charlin Jones-Chavez, Chris Cortez, Christi Fish, Courtney Clevenger, David Deering, David Rodriguez, Ernest Hernandez, Heather Green, James Borrego, Jan McKinney, Joan Duncan, KC Gonzalez, Kristina Garza, Lisa Martz, Liz Rockstroh, Madison Underwood, Mitzi Shipley, Nicholas Ward, Rebecca Luther, Renee Hopkins, Ron Ellis, Sarah Harless, Shashi Pinheiro, Steven Woodall, Teresa Kelley, Wendy Frost, Various Offices

This group of talented individuals ensured the virtual Commencement was a success. They helped communicate about the event, ensured all of the technical requirements were met, and that the graduate was center to the program. UTSA has never held a virtual Commencement so this was done with no reference of what to expect. There were a lot of steps to get there, but this team delivered quality!