DHRL Employees Win Diversity Award, Operational Excellence Awards, more Posted Thursday, June 23, 2022 @ 12:03 PM Launched in 1998, the Student Development and Enrollment Services (SDES) Appreciation Celebration recognizes the division’s recent accomplishments while honoring employees for their years of service and other merit awards. This year, several UCF Housing employees were recognized for their exceptional hard work. The first portion of the celebration recognized certain employees for their years of service within their departments. The below UCF Housing individuals reached the following milestones this year: Wanda Cortes, 5 years Shelly Minnis, 5 years Victor Rivera, 5 years Joshua Robinson, 5 years Mari Sievinen, 5 years Jillian Sturdivant, 5 years Chudney Defreitas Thomas, 10 years Hoang Nguyen, 10 years Shortly after, three UCF Housing employees were selected for the following merit awards. Commitment to Diversity Award: Karen Rodriguez Karen is the Social Media Marketing Coordinator for UCF Housing. In addition to her efforts which have reached over 50,000 social media users in the last 30 days alone, Karen hosted monthly events this past year to bring awareness to the Cuban crisis that made international headlines last summer. She established a space for UCF’s Cuban and Cuban-American faculty, staff, and students to speak about their experiences with the oppressive Cuban regime. She invited guest speakers and collaborated with UCF Library to create a guide with Cuban resources, books, and videos. She worked with the UCF Latino Faculty and Staff Association to continue to provide resources for those affected or interested in learning more. Additionally, Karen served as a resource for the UCF Cuban American Student Association and even supported the efforts of other Florida universities. This event series won UCF Diversity Program of the Month for October 2021. Karen has participated in about a dozen interviews where she has shared her family’s experience and where she could translate for various Cubans whose stories weren’t being heard due to the language barrier. Through these efforts and more, Karen was recently named a 30 Under 30 UCF Alumni for 2022. Student Operational Excellence Award: Taylor Torres-Griffin Taylor Torres-Griffin is the Marketing Assistant for UCF Housing. She was recognized for her incredible can-do attitude, attention to detail, and fresh ideas regarding marketing efforts. Taylor joined the marketing team at a time when there were many vacancies on the team. The workload could have been overwhelming to any average employee, especially a student employee, but Taylor rose to the occasion and really helped keep the marketing team afloat while the team was rebuilding over the next several months. She has taken on various projects that have been instrumental to our thousands of on-campus residents, as well as the thousands of prospective students and their families. Taylor assists with the set up and breakdown of our various housing tour rooms, sets up directional signs across campus to help visiting families navigate campus during open houses and orientations, compiles housing social media data and analytics to help improve and create engaging content, and she also oversees UCF Housing’s free movie streaming service for residents, where she chooses about two dozen new films per month for residents to stream. Taylor does an exceptional job with every project she’s given while still being active as a College of Business Ambassador, Relay for Life board member, and more. OPS Operational Excellence Award: Blaise Guerrero Blaise Guerrero is the Residential Support Services Coordinator for UCF Housing. Blaise was the OPS employee selected for the Operational Excellence Award due to his exceptional qualities and commitment to UCF Housing and the university throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. Blaise has worked tirelessly and continuously since joining UCF Housing to ensure that our response to student care during the pandemic is delivered efficiently with consistency. Blaise’s support has extended beyond residential COVID-19 responses, and he has stepped up to assist with other departmental needs such as filling in during Area Coordinator vacancies. The Department of Housing and Residence Life would like to congratulate all nominees and winners for their exceptional hard work this past year! Back