Awards Honor Faculty & Staff for Exceptional & Innovative Work
Several members of the music department were on hand to receive their Spirit of Superior Award.
The Spirit of Superior Award is given to individuals and teams who actively demonstrate and model the values of UW-Superior, and who make a difference in the campus climate and the lives of those who work and study on campus.
At the University of Wisconsin-Superior, we are committed to academic excellence, with an emphasis on student-focused learning, intellectual and personal development, continuous improvement, inclusivity, community partnerships, and global awareness.
Spirit of Superior -Team Award
The 2014-15 Spirit of Superior Team Award goes to the faculty and staff in the Department of Music. As a unit, members of this department exemplify the Spirit of Superior through the passion, creativity, and energy that they bring to their studios, classrooms, and our community on a daily basis and through a variety of events that are open to the public and students within our region.
Throughout each semester, on most days of the week, you can find any number of musical options being presented by students, faculty, or staff that both move and entertain you. Each year the Music Department hosts high school musicians across central and northern Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Michigan for the annual Chorfest High School Honor Choir, the Tri-State Honor Band, the Tri-State Honor Jazz Ensemble Festival and the UW-Superior Honors Orchestra. Each of these rehearsals provides students with lessons and culminates in a wonderful evening concert held on campus.
In addition, the Music Department provides an array of small ensembles that include performances by the choir, band, orchestra, jazz, opera workshop, percussion, steel drum, and guitar. Each December, the A Cappella and Chamber Choir kicks off the holidays with their annual Christmas Choral Concert series. The faculty perform as part of the university recital series throughout the year.
All of these events provide opportunities to attract and retain students, not for the music majors alone, but for other programs across the institution, as many non-major are involved in the performances.
The Music Department is commended for its work to recruit students to their major, as well as for the amount of scholarships that are awarded through the UW-Superior Foundation each year. Overall, alumni and supporters of our music programs contribute $28,000 in scholarship funds to our students annually.
The faculty and staff also do their part to raise scholarship funds. An example of this was seen in December 2014 at the Chancellor’s Ball. Dr. Beth Gilbert and Dr. Erin Aldridge donated a live performance to a successful bidder as part of the Alumni Association’s scholarship fund raising event. This live performance brought in over $2,000 for new scholarships.
Also noteworthy is the fact that 15 faculty and staff in the Music Department play with the Duluth Superior Symphony Orchestra and two perform regularly with the Lyric Opera of the North. Just recently, Dr. Richard Robbins was named Choral Director for the DSSO Chorus.
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Spirit of Superior -Academic Staff
The Academic Staff Award for the Spirit of Superior goes to Ms. Jen Bird. Jen is the Director of First Year Experience. During her nearly 15 years working for UW-Superior, Jen has consistently modeled and demonstrated the values of UW-Superior. As the Assistant Director of Housing, she emphasized personal attention to all of her resident hall team, ensuring that every student living in the resident halls was provided the individualized attention they need for their success at UW-Superior. In her role as Freshman Year Experience Coordinator, she has continued to provide such support to not only our new UW-Superior students, but also to their families, ensuring their first experience with UW-Superior is a positive one.
Anyone who has worked with Jen knows that she is an honest, sincere, and humble leader. She is also kind, hardworking, and genuine. Jen has been selected by her peers to serve on Academic Staff Senate for almost 10 years. Last year, she was nominated and selected to Chair our Academic Staff Senate. Jen continues to put the needs of students and her programs first. She is always looking and being asked to proactively anticipate and solve the problems of our campus. Recently Jen was an active member of the Master Planning and Retention Committees. She has also been asked to chair the search and screen for the Director of Advising and Career Services position, and in December 2014 she managed the Winter Commencement ceremony.
Spirit of Superior -Classified Staff
The classified staff award for the Spirit of Superior goes to Mr. Tom Janicki. Tom is an Information Services Supervisor II within Technology Services. In November, when the entire network went down after major hardware failures occurred in the campus data center. Tom led the way to quickly resolve the issue using impeccable technical skills. He demonstrates a creative use of resources and shows an unmatched dedication to the campus and the network that he takes full ownership for maintaining.
We were all thankful for his leadership during the incident, but what we should recognize him for, is the way that day in and day out he embodies what the award is all about. Tom teaches CISCO at LSC part time and it benefits UW-Superior in so many ways. He is a recruiter;encouraging students in the 2 year program to consider the benefits of a 4 year degree on their careers and he has recruited his top students to apply for work here on campus. He is able to apply the needs of teaching and learning to the way that our network resources are managed.
Our data center hosts a Community Area Network that is used by local governments and school districts. Tom meets regularly with community IT leaders to discuss how technology can support the needs of the entire community and what role the university can take in meeting those needs. The mere fact that most people don’t even know who Tom is, is a tribute to his humble leadership style, but for those of us who do know Tom, he has earned our respect for his honesty with the knowledge that he sincerely takes ownership for making sure that the network used by our Students, Faculty, Staff and the community is secure, fast, accessible, and reliable.
Spirit of Superior -Faculty
The faculty Spirit of Superior Award goes to Dr. Kristin Riker Coleman. Kristin is an Assistant Professor in the Natural Sciences Department. She provides personal attention to every student she encounters, whether in the classroom, in her office or in the hall. She was nominated for “Making a Difference” in a student’s life this year due to her advisement efforts. She has supervised multiple Undergraduate Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activities (URSCA) projects, co-chaired the URSCA committee for several years, and been involved with many HIPS including First Year Seminar (FYS), Academic Service Learning (ASL), and URSCA).
She is an advocate for all students and understands the unique challenges our students face. Not only has Kristin maintained two scholarship lines (basic research involving hydrogeology and SoTL work), she jumps on any opportunity for intellectual development from campus book club, to campus distance learning and Scholarship of Teaching/Learning (SOTL) opportunities, to numerous off campus training and workshops. She regularly participates in and presents at her discipline professional organizations.
Kristin is dedicated to improving the numbers of underrepresented minorities in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) fields. To further this goal, she is part of a Wisconsin Alliance for Minority Participation (WISCAMP) grant. Additionally, since 2011 she has been an advisory board member for the UW system-wide Women in Science program.
News Contact: Tom Hansen | 715-394-8260 | 
thansen7@uwsuper.edu
