What began as a “bold idea” in the 2017 Bold Ideas Challenge has now come to fruition in Fresno State’s newest employee recognition program — High Five. Click here to read about how the program began.

High Fives are easy to give — simply go to the High Five website on the Organizational Excellence webpage, click “Give a High Five” and fill out the form to send kudos to anyone on campus. Your message will be delivered straight to their inbox, and recipients will be acknowledged weekly in Campus News.

Read below how your colleagues are going above and beyond to help the campus community.

(Note: Campus News edited comments only for misspellings and missing or incomplete words. They appear mostly as written for each employee.)

Goes Above & Beyond

Ruth Brisco, Public Health
Ruth is an excellent administrative support coordinator. She responds to requests in a timely manner and has the most pleasant personality. The Department of Public Health is thankful to work with her!

Matthew Doyle, Library – Research Services
Matthew Doyle provided an excellent presentation at the Provost's Panel: Best Practices for Virtual Instruction. Matt gave a great presentation about leveraging library resources online. I find that Matt consistently works above and beyond, shining the spotlight on the library services and the numerous resources available here. Way to represent the Library, Matt!

Britt Foster, Research Services – Henry Madden Library
Britt always works above and beyond in her service to students and faculty, her colleagues and the university. Her work as co-coordinator of the Research Services Department is exemplary. She helps the unit pursue goals for improvement, facilitates effective communication, and is collegial and supportive in all her interactions. During the current coronavirus crisis, Britt played an instrumental role in working with Library administration, faculty colleagues, library staff, and student assistants to ramp up and evaluate virtual services. Britt does everything she can to assure that the library meets faculty and student needs, and is thoughtful in supporting her colleagues in a stressful time. She also reaches out to colleagues outside the library to assure that we are all working together effectively to help students overcome barriers to success.

Alexis Holladay, College of Science and Mathematics, Advising and Resources Center
Alexis went above and beyond during a peak time for academic advisors by spending extra time preparing schedule blocks for our incoming freshman.

Melissa Tav, communications specialist for College of Health and Human Services
Melissa worked quickly to create a beautiful and moving email for our interim dean to send to all of our CHHS alumni, highlighting a nursing alumna working on the front lines of COVID-19 and letting alumni know all that CHHS is doing to ensure student success during this time. She has recently written powerful profiles of our alumni, crafted several press releases and continued to promote our college through social media. Melissa's writing is the voice of CHHS and we would be lost without her!

Matt Montez, Facilities Operations – Carpenter
Matt is a hard worker and maintains a positive attitude while handling strenuous physical and mental challenges on the job. He is one of many who sets an example for others, encouraging coworkers and performing quality work. His construction training and experience are well used on campus projects and maintenance. Way to go Matt!

Juan Torres, Technology Services
Juan Torres is a jewel to have at Fresno State. He was my friendly neighbor for a few years at the McKee Fisk building in 2002. He has always been supportive of our technology needs at Alumni but he was instrumental in preparing the campus operator system to work remotely. He installed the Avaya-one X software on several laptops and provided crash-course training to those involved. He is blessed with patience and a calm manner. Juan is definitely deserving of a High Five and so much more!

Department
Circulation
The Henry Madden Library building remained open to students during the initial period of the coronavirus crisis to help students and faculty prepare for virtual instruction. Circulation staff worked tirelessly to plan services, place cleaning supplies and helpful signage, and change configuration of public spaces to ensure social distancing. They set up new checkout processes for materials and ramped up virtual services. They kept the doors open with limited staffing, provided excellent customer service as the phone rang off the hook, worked effectively as a team and were proactive and solutions-oriented. Special thanks to Taylor Peterson, Arantes Armendariz and Mai Thao, who worked the last shifts in the library building as their colleagues supported them from home!

Saved My Bacon!

Glen Hunt, Technology Services
I came in to the office and the copier was unplugged, I made a few phone calls, left a voicemail and Glen returned my call right away. He was able to walk me through the process, patiently.

Peter Robertson, Alumni Engagement and Annual Giving
Peter, thank you for supporting LGBTQ+ Programs and Services with putting together 30 graduation boxes for our Rainbow Graduation class of 2020! You are a servant leader. Thank you.

Department
Grounds
A big thank you to our grounds team who helped make the Armenian Genocide monument look so beautiful in honor of Armenian Martyr's Day (April 24). I gave them very little notice and they made it happen ... they saved my bacon!

Provides Excellent Customer Service

Jeanine Craven, Public Health
Jeanine is an administrative support assistant II in the Department of Public Health. She is our first point of contact for the students, and she is wonderful at greeting them. We are so thankful to work with Jeanine!

Chor Yang, Nursing
For being kind, bold and always supportive of faculty and students.

Diane Martinez, Nursing
For being kind, bold and supportive.

Tabitha Washington, Nursing
For being kind, bold and supportive.

Lily Marquez, Nursing
For being kind, bold and supportive to faculty and staff.

JoLynne Blake, Center for Faculty Excellence
I was torn between whether I should give JoLynne Blake a High Five! for Provides Excellent Customer Services or Saved my Bacon, because both categories apply. I am giving a webinar next week to the catalogers of all 23 CSU campuses. I have never hosted a webinar on Zoom, so there has been a steep learning curve for me. JoLynne has patiently worked with me over the past few weeks, teaching me how to do this. Now, I feel confident enough to be able to give it a try! I have really appreciated her calm demeanor. She has provided excellent customer services, with the utmost care and patience, and she also saved my bacon!

Mike Nourian, Plant Ops
Mike was very responsive with our request to get our cabinets worked on. He was knowledgeable and had great customer service. He even went above and beyond what we requested. Our department is lucky to have such great people like Mike and the rest of his team supporting us.