Lauren Reese

The ITS Lunch and Learns are fun, educational, and a great opportunity to spend quality time with fellow ITS’ers. As “hosts” Joy and I look forward to each and every one. Unfortunately, for the last L&L of this semester, neither Joy nor I were going to be able to attend. Instead of having to cancel, we asked Lauren to serve as host. (Please note, Lauren had already been the content expert for one L&L this semester.) Lauren didn’t hesitate to step in! Further, she did a GREAT JOB! Lauren’s can-do attitude and willingness to take on leadership roles is just one example of what makes her an exceptional member of the ITS team. Thank you, Lauren, for being so awesome!!

Joy Taylor and Susan Kehoe

Mike Rothgeb

Back in May, we moved Jamf from Prem to the Cloud, and in doing so we switched out authentication to ADFS, which at the time only supported on the landing page, which was being used for Office 365. I was ok with this since we were piggy-backing off the service.

Fast-forward a few months, Mike recently upgraded the ADFS servers to 2016, which now supports multiple landing pages and he reached out to me to ask what I would like to have on the Jamf specific landing page. I sent over the wording and the ITS long logo and Mike had it on the Dev server so quickly…. However, later in the week the Office 365 meeting happened and it was brought up that we should use gold bubbles and the black and white ITS long logo, I really didn’t have a preference, I just felt bad Mike had to do it again, but again Mike just did it super quick and it looked amazing.

I really appreciate Mike’s efforts. One for reaching out to me and letting me know that this was now possible and two for being so efficient and quick about it. It really helps differentiate the two services and may not seem like a big deal but I’ve gotten a lot of feedback that people love it! Truly we don’t use enough gold, we’re more green color users, maybe it’s because some people can’t pull off the gold look, but Mike did it very well for Jamf’s ADFS page.

Jed Frye

Ryan Sakai

Ryan quickly worked to stop the Windows 10 upgrade rollout. Then he worked feverishly to troubleshoot issues with the upgrade. The Advanced Desktop team and Support Center quickly fixed all the computers that had issues.

Bravo! for taking ownership and following through to fix customer computers in a timely fashion.

David Landry

Alex Seals

I would like to nominate Alex Seals of Desktop Support for a Caught in the Act award. Alex took the time to research and solve a technical issue that I was having with my pc, rather than taking the easy solution and recommending a reload of the operating system. Problem-solving one audio issue at a time. Thank you, Alex!

Brian Gantt

Zane Phipps

Zane has saved the day several times when it comes to ITS’s support of orientation activities. Most recently, the NSFP office had a time-sensitive space request that we had less than 24 hours to help resolve. Zane was easy to get a hold of and was quick to help me find a solution. Zane stepping in to help is a prime example of living the ITS values of teamwork and communication and his efforts are greatly appreciated.

Lauren Reese

Jordan Firaben

I had to call the support center to get assistance to set up a contactor with 2Fa and on the VPN. Jordan was a huge help. Jordan was patient and was willing to go the extra mile to get the contractor set up. I had to try to switch back and forth between the contractor and the support center. When I asked, Jordan said I could call him back directly and the contractor could call him directly so we didn’t have to repeat the problem. Jorden knew which questions to ask so we could figure out the problem. He was willing to help and never got frustrated! Jordan walked me through the changes I needed to make so we could get the contractor set up with 2Fa and then the VPN. Jordan was GREAT!

Thank you Jordan!

Carrie Stewart

Chris Roth

Chris is the best technician who has assisted me. Best Around! When he commits, he will never let you down.

Jude Peebody

Carrie Stewart

I would like to nominate Carrie Stewart for giving great support during yesterday’s (Thursday, Nov 15th) snowstorm and University Closure. She came into the office trying to reschedule the interview times, not just once but a couple of times, with the candidates, to complete Thursday interviews. Her efforts were outstanding! Yesterday was not an ideal situation for all involved, but we worked through the process and the interviews went off without a hitch. Thank You, Carrie !!

Toni Mehrman

Basil Sindhu

Basil easily helped fix the problem with my computer and explained in simple language what the issue was so I could understand. He also looked up the problem after I called in so he would be prepared when I arrived. He was able to explain the issue so I could understand what was wrong rather than just fixing the problem and sending me out. He also explained what he looked up when I called about the problem so that he and I could both understand what was wrong.

Rebekah Ansbro

Andrew Gambino

Andrew is excellent and patient with clients!

Mavjoneh Tafazdi

Larry Marca

Larry is always quick to respond when I come to him with concerns that may be network-related. He always follows through on those concerns to the end, even when they turn out to be unrelated to the network.

Recently I brought an issue to him that was significantly affecting PXE boot times. The issue could just have easily been a server issue rather than a network issue. However, knowing the adverse effect this would have on customer imaging, Larry took full ownership of this issue and continued to troubleshoot (even working late) until he found the cause and fully resolved it.

When assisting me in troubleshooting various issues over the years, he always asks pertinent questions about the symptoms and actions already taken. And then, based on my answers, offers helpful suggestions on the next possible steps while performing his own investigations independently.

Larry is always transparent with me on actions he is taking and possible causes he is investigating. This kind of openness fosters trust and understanding that I appreciate.

Ryan Sakai

Kerin Seward

For several years now, Kerin Seward had designed the logo for the annual Association of Collegiate Computing Services of Virginia (ACCS) Conference. We take it for granted that she always comes up with fantastic art ideas to match our conference themes. Even our constituents take notice! Thank you Kerin for always coming through for us!

Teresa Gibbons

Mike Rothgeb

Although I am technically savvy enough to be dangerous, there is still a lot of technology I don’t quite understand what it does or how it fits in the picture. Mike always takes the time to answer my questions and give me a holistic view. Together we try to assess the impact on users so I can craft more concise maintenance alerts that increase ITS transparency. Mike makes teamwork easy! Thanks for being awesome always!

Christina Crockett

Teresa Gibbons

I really appreciate Teresa’s commitment to customer service and to her staff–especially the way she shows appreciation for her co-workers. All of ITS should be celebrating Teresa at the end of our very successful Customer Service Week, as she was the driving factor in getting this important occasion back on the schedule of events for ITS. And she rocked her Lunch & Learn presentation yesterday on the FISH! Philosophy as well. Thank you for all you do to make ITS great!

Kerin Seward

Lori Polnow

Lori is so helpful when I have questions about Banner maintenance. She helps me craft more concise maintenance messages, which helps provide the ITS transparency we are striving for as One ITS. Thank you Lori for being amazing!

Christina Crockett

Devin Bist

Brian Walther who is George Mason’s University Counsel appointed by the governor was getting a new Windows 10 VM because his old iMac died. However for the VM to access the required server it needs to have a special reserved DHCP. To add extra pressure to the situation there was a consultant here to set up the specialized software.

I tried calling Mike Briggs however he was out, so I was like I’ll call who I know can get the job done, Devin Bist. I called Devin, explained the situation and he was able to move the old reservation to the new VM and had it working in literally less than 2 minutes. It was amazing and Brian even made the comment “that was fast.”

Seriously awesome work like this makes ITS look great, and that’s why I love my A-Team Players! This also makes me really grateful we have awesome people in ITS like Devin.

Thank you again, Devin!
-Jed

Tyra Bookhart

Tyra helped me understand what it means to register a device. Thank you!

Angelica Walker

Jordan McKinney

Jordan went on a trouble call for instructor training and spent over an hour assisting them. He even stayed after his shift ended to make sure the customer comfortable with the equipment and understood everything before he left. The customer was very pleased with the quality of service he received from Jordan.

Doug Whetzel

Tommy Dang

Tommy has set the standard for turning in signed EWPs and probationary evaluations. All of Tommy’s new hires are on track with their EWPs and reviews. Without any reminders he has gotten this paperwork all turned in to ITS HR. Thank you Tommy for completing this necessary paperwork.

Carrie Stewart

Timothy Crum

Worked with faculty member from economics department to assist with a technology space not owned and operated by our department.

Troy Powers

Nicholas Anderson

Nick assisted me with changing the computer settings for all of our new Global Center rooms to solve a problem we had with our Epson touch devices and drivers. He worked very quickly and efficiently without any need for assistance.

Doug Whetzel

Mukarram Shahzad

Mukarram is one of our highest users of Bomgar (our remote assistance tool), which is great that he’s using our tools to resolve customer issues quickly, because I know they appreciate immediate help while they’re on the phone. With him being the highest user of Bomgar, when he reports an issue I make sure to make it a priority.

Having Mukarram not only report the issue to me (when I was at the water cooler filling up my bottles like I do three times a day), but also follow up in an email with a video attachment of the problem is super helpful so we have documentation of the issue if I’m not able to reproduce the problem.

Mukarram always gives great feedback. He doesn’t just say “It’s not working” he always comes to me with what’s not working and what he’s done to try to fix the issue, which I cannot stress how much I appreciate. It shows that he made an effort to troubleshoot, that he knows what he’s talking about, and I know where to pick up from where he left of in troubleshooting so that steps aren’t repeated and time isn’t wasted.

Again I just wanted to thank Mukarram for his everyday hustle in helping the customers so hard! Seriously, he’s awesome.

Jed Frye

Cherie Galantis

When I had to unexpectedly leave campus and could not attend the CaLT Director presentation on Thursday 9/13, I reached out to Cherie about 45 minutes before the session to see if it was going to be streamed. After spending her morning just getting the technology working due to a recent power outage, Cherie was able to work out a solution so I could participate remotely within 15 minutes and I was able to fully participate in the session. Just to make this clear, this wasn’t a planned feature, it was a last minute request and in spite of everything else going on, Cherie was able to make it happen! And it worked without issue.

John Prette

Pray Timalsina

I called George Mason today and was helped by Pray Timalsina. He knew exactly how to solve my problem and it appeared he had the steps to find my solution through the George Mason website memorized. I quickly found the solution I was looking for because of him. Great job!

Warm Regards,
Danielle Knight

Karl Wimmer

Karl is an exceptional person and a pleasure to work with. Impossible is not a word in his dictionary. He identified a hardware issue for me that was a “its working subpar let it just go” type of issue and resolved it for me. He took initiative when it wasn’t even necessary and went above and beyond to fix the issue.

Thank you
Mukarram Shahzad

Hunter Massie

During the two weeks prior to the start of the Fall 2018 semester, our department did extra maintenance to ensure equipment is in working order. Hunter contributed to the maintenance of over 30+ classrooms in which he did much more than what was required and did so on his own accord. Hunter is an exceptional employee who continues to lead by example and we are very thankful of his efforts.

Doug Whetzel

Rodrigo Alva

On Thursday, May 31st – Sunday, June 3rd, Rodrigo spent over 20 hrs of overtime fixing a classroom system in Founders Hall Rm 111. Background: On Thursday, the vendor decided to get a head start and begin working in a Founders Hall classroom and completely removed the technology in that classroom. Unfortunately, the room was STILL reserved by the Registrar’s Office and had a classroom scheduled in there that evening. As expected, the faculty informed the staff and immediately elevated the issue.

Rodrigo was notified and directed the vendor to stop all work and report to the room immediately. He helped the vendor to get the room up and running ASAP. As it was only one other technician, Rodrigo hung projectors by himself while the vendor worked on the rack portion. Over the next few days, Rodrigo helped with troubleshooting and they eventually were able to bring the room to an operational state before the next class.

Rodrigo is a rock star. He went OVER and beyond his expected duty. It wasn’t his job to put in the extra work. In fact, many broken processes were exposed during this debacle, but his dedication to the Mason community caused him to go beyond his position responsibilities and own convenience to ensure a positive teaching and learning environment for the faculty and students. Rodrigo is a model Mason employee for sure.

Crystal Clemons

Toni Mehrman

Negotiations for the cost of a Leadership Fellowship had already brought down the price by over $1,600. So I figured we were out of luck when we were told about a 3% fee for use of P-cards. Enter Toni. After back and forth with the Fellowship team, Toni explained the Commonwealth’s purchasing constraints and asked if the fee could be waived. Their response? “Sure!” Thank you Toni! Thank you for unfailingly acting as a University steward. Thank you for never hesitating to negotiate!

Susan Kehoe

Cherie Galantis

I want to recognize Cherie Galantis for her excellent customer service! There was a meeting scheduled for Innovation Hall Room 334 using WebEx. The meeting started off well with the exception that the participants in IH334 did not have a functioning microphone to be able to communicate with the other participants on WebEx. CaLT contacted VTC for us and Cherie quickly arrived and troubleshot the issue, setting up a phone bridge for our use and we were in business!! With that said, I want to also note this meeting was not on the VTC radar, but Cherie cheerfully jumped into this issue explaining everything she was doing while also working with her team to quickly resolve the issue. Thanks to Cherie and thanks to her team which assisted too! Because of your efforts the meeting was a success.

John Kettlewell

Stephanie Werhane

I’ve known Stephanie for a long time and always known she’s super nice, but haven’t had much of a chance to work with her since doing the Office 365 email migration when we were building troubleshooting and instructions pages.

With Jamf Cloud, we had already migrated all the data and started moving end user Mac to the cloud, however there was one piece missing…. mac.gmu.edu was still redirecting to the old on-prem instance. It may not seem like a big deal, but to the customers it really is a big deal. Having to go to an easy to remember site is a much better user experience than having to got to https://casper.gmu.edu:8443/enroll; no one is going to remember that off the top of their head.

When we had our on-prem instance this problem was easily solved with our F5 load balancer because all traffic flowed through us. Now with being in the Cloud the traffic goes to Amazon AWS, so it complicated the matter. We tried to do see if we could do it with DNS or F5, however we could only do the entire domain and not a URL path which was not what we wanted. Finally I asked Stephanie Werhane out of the blue and since she’s amazing she didn’t say “Not my job” or “No” she immediately gave her thoughts and proposed solution. I was blown away. Not only did she suggest it but within hours we had a working redirect. I could not have been more happy and wanted to give her a hug…. I’m not sure she knows how much that meant to me, which is why I’m writing a Caught in the Act, because she needs to be recognized as an awesome, talented, hardworking individual.

Thank you again Stephanie. You’re awesome!

Jed Frye

Alex Galantis

Alex has been crucial to the CVT team by being available at a moments notice to drive (finance golf cart) members of our team to other areas on campus to put out VC fires or address urgent client issues. There are times when we need to go to Merten Hall from Innovation in less than 5 minutes and Alex has been able to take us. We greatly appreciate the team player attitude.

Kudos!
CVT Team, Cherie, Christina, Matt and Doug

William Horan

William came to help about a problem in Innovation 222. While he was not able to fix the problem (when logging on the front computer it says there are no servers available) he did explain what the likely issue was and offered use of a laptop as an alternative. He was also very helpful with getting other computers in the room to work that had not been working.

Catherine Sausville

Luis Herrera Fernandez

Luis is one of the best student workers I’ve met! He commits to deliverables and delivers on commitments, identified customer problems and maintains ownership until the issue is fully resolved, asks questions to clearly understand the customers’ needs, and shares information with customers to build understanding.

Steven Leeds

Mukarram Shahzad

I wanted to pass along to you the great help Mukarram Shahzad provided me. He was able to resolve my problem in a timely manner. Very courteous and patient (he had to wait on me and bring it down to layman’s term tech wise).

I have not had to use the help desk often with an internal IT staff on hand, but on the rare occasion I do, it reaffirms I have not ever had a bad experience. Keep up the good job.

Connie Benson
Director of Recreation

Mike Quigley

There was an ongoing trial our office was participating in for a different telephone system. An issue occurred that took these phones offline. Various groups were involved with troubleshooting but things didn’t come together until Mike showed up. He was asked to resolve the issue and given incomplete data. Mike took the time to speak with me, get an overview situation of how we had arrived at this point and then jumped into action. He quickly assessed our environment, determined what it was going to take to migrate us to the standard VOIP phone system and worked diligently to migrate us. After being without phones for multiple days, Mike had us up and running within an hour. It was great to have him listen, understand and resolve the issue. He also followed through by checking in with each one of us the following day to insure everything was still running properly. He did have someone helping him as well and we also appreciate his help. Mike was a great example of One ITS. This for sure warrants a Caught in the Act. Mike’s help and attention to detail were immensely appreciated by the ITSO!

Tony Houdek

Owura Gyamfi

Dear George Mason University,

I am writing to express my sincere appreciation for the first-class service that was provided to me by Owura in IT Services tech support on 30 April 2018.

My son and I, as mother of a new entering freshman this Fall semester, are both overwhelmed, stressed, and anxious with ensuring that all the items on the checklist and to dos for George Mason University are fully completed before the May 1 due date and before arriving for orientation June 18 to 19.

Owura, in IT Services, was soooo helpful in working through and explaining sites, usernames, passwords, and logging in successfully to all the sites such as MasonLive, CAS, Outlook.office365.com, Patriot web, myMason, Patriot Pass, Mason Federated Service, and Portal. We had issues logging in to Portal. Owura took the time to listen, research, and assure. He was kind, friendly, and empathetic. Our levels of stress and anxiety have been significantly reduced because of Owura’s “TLC” in managing and resolving our log in issues.

Overall, kudos for the awesome interpersonal skills.

Keep up the good work in customer service.

Once again, thank you.

Sincerely,
Elaine C. Munson

Patrick Tam

Patrick arrived to provide support within minutes of my putting in the work order request – he mentioned he had been on his way back to his office following a previous call when he received my request in his queue. Instead of continuing on to his office first, he turned right around on the spot and came to assist me.

Patrick was very quick to diagnose the issue I was having and knew just what to do. He even went above and beyond by taking added time out of his busy schedule to upload the upgraded version of MS Office and ensure that each application opened and functioned properly before leaving.

Patrick listened very carefully to my “layman’s” description of the issues I was experiencing with my Outlook email and was terrific at putting me at ease while also not making me feel like I didn’t know what I was talking about! He has an very good nature and an incredible amount of patience, especially when fielding “dumb” questions from non-IT folks.

Patrick thoroughly explained everything he was doing and why. I honestly couldn’t have been more pleased with our interaction. Not only did he resolve the issue, he was sure to follow up with me by phone the next morning to ensure I was able to boot up and everything was still operating properly before he closed the work order.

Emily Gibson

LeAnn Pittman

The Faculty Senate was videoconferencing their first meeting with Dr Cabrera speaking. Obviously high level. There was an issue with the content dropping every 8 seconds during the test period, remote sites only. I called LeAnn for advice, and not only did she assist but walked over to help even though they decided to live with the results. Once she got there the content had stabilized. That is going the extra mile, something LeAnn always does! Kudos to her!

Cherie Galantis

Johnny Gerhard

I ran to the NOC during a business meeting of mine. I needed to get immediate assistance from Devin. Unfortunately Devin was elsewhere on campus but Johnny offered to help on the spot. Johnny immediately jumped in and began to help. I didn’t expect him to offer, but his willingness to help is always refreshing to see, and worthy of commendation.

Matthew Berlejung

Tony Houdek

I first want to thank Tony for all the support he’s always given ADT.

A long time ago we were in a bad situation with Jamf on-prem not being able to upgrade to a supported version. I feel like ITSO was a huge advocate for helping people understand how important this service is.

Once we finally got momentum with migrating to Jamf Cloud Tony was instrumental in almost every task. I would explain how the service is performed and what was involved and Tony would just pick it up, I never had to explain anything twice, and he would look it up and Splunk and give me best practice as to what should be done, which I always follow. During the entire project he was a great confidant that I could go to and he could help think of solutions for tasks that needed to be done in a secure way. One particular issues that stands out is the super secure mesa/LDAP connector, which is the first of its kind ever attempted.

I always love how Tony can be so level and calm even when tensions and stress levels are rising. With Tony I know he just gets it, so I always love talking to him and highly value what he has to say.

While the project isn’t yet over, I feel so much better about the nearly completed status because of all the help he has provided along the way.

Thank you Tony!

Jed Frye

Mark Craft

I wanted to thank Mark Craft for all his help with the Jamf Cloud migration.

He was the authoritative source for many technical challenges related to the F5, LDAP connector, and ADFS. Mark was always very clam and explained everything very reasonable and was super available and responsive which help significantly with the project progress. I love that Mark is very approachable and easy to work with and explains things so that you can understand them. I was super grateful that Mark was on this project and feel like it would have stalled without him.

Thank you Mark,

Jed Frye

Richard Jackson Jr, Dmitri Chebotarov

I would like to nominate Richard and Dmitri who manage F5 load balancer for a Caught in the Act award. When we found a few students can not access new Banner CAS single signon website because their local network blocked non-regular ports, Richard and Dmitri quickly provided a solution on F5 load balancer and helped on troubleshooting. I appreciate their teamwork and technical skills.

Tian Hui Wang

Phil Kopyscinski

The good folks in Arlington were trying to keep a classroom running until the summer refresh. Unfortunately, the plan was failing. Faculty were frustrated with the work arounds. Phil spent the morning assisting the Arlington staff rebuild pieces of the room. That night, faculty teaching in the room wrote Marilyn exuberantly declaring how thrilled they were with the fixes!

Thank you Phil for stepping up and stepping in and for embodying the spirit of One ITS!

Susan Kehoe

Mike Benedict, Casey Campbell

We were in the School of Dance studio in the de Laski building. CVT was setting up for a 1 pm demo when we found the network ports in the 2nd studio were dead at 12:30 pm. We called Mike and Casey to ask them to assist in a pinch.

Mike was having a less than perfect day, but he dropped his lunch and patched the port for us within minutes. He didn’t have to help, but his “get it done” attitude wouldn’t allow us to fail.

Casey showed up, minutes later to find the job done. However, he stayed for the demo and was integral to help CVT in explaining the technology to the rep from the Provost and School of Dance.

True Casey and Mike behavior. They are awesome.

Matthew Berlejung

Devin Bist, Yu Kuo

While troubleshooting a connectivity problem with our Videoconference backbone, Devin joined a Webex meeting with me between 1130 and 2pm. With no notice whatsoever, he was able to free up time since he knew this was of high importance. Yuko also joined for 2 hours. If it was not for them joining on such short notice, I am afraid our infrastructure would still be in bad shape came Friday morning. I am super thankful they assisted so quickly and diligently on such short notice. Thanks ITS Fam!

Matthew Berlejung

Kerin Seward

Honestly there are not enough positive additives to describe the amazing Kerin and the beautiful work that she does….

Last week I sent Kerin an email asking her for help with the branding of Self Service for all the managed Macs since we’re going to Jamf Cloud and this new version supports branding. Kerin emailed me back with six designs that she had created, all of which looked fabulous! Although when I started plugging in the designs I realized the specs were not clear, and I had to go back to her for modifications. I felt bad that I kept asking her to change stuff, but she never complained and was crazy quick to get the modifications back to me. She was also able to give me some pointers which were externally helpful and went great with what I was trying to do.

I’m so pleased with how Self Service looks and I could not have done it without Kerin. Thank you again Kerin!

Jed Frye

Mike Rothgeb

It’s a shame I don’t get to work with Mike Rothgeb more often, because he really is an awesome person to work with, and his work ethic and work that he does is beyond reproach. Mike is always very calm, but you can tell he has passion for his work.

I’ve known Mike since I started at Desktop Support in 2010 and has always been a great and helpful resource to me and this project was no exception. Mike went above and beyond and took on responsibilities that really should have been done before they got to him, but Mike did them anyway. He also served as a great confidant during the project who I could go to for advice on issues that I had not encountered. I felt like Mike was a huge advocate for us in meetings, and would always be honest and rational and was sure to set reasonable expectations for all parties involved. He would also ask the right right questions to seek understanding. I do know for this project, getting the mesa/LDAP connector and ADFS working would seem impossible without having him around.

Jed Frye

John Kettlewell, Cheng Cheu, Whitney Sublett

My LCD went bad on my Mac so I couldn’t see anything. We have an extra computer in the office, but it was Windows. I was having difficulty logging into MESA. Cheng advised me what to try. When I went to Whitney, she added me to one MESA container. Unfortunately, this didn’t work. I called Cheng back, and we tried something else. I called back a third time because the previous thing didn’t work. He got John Kettlewell involved, who was able to add me to the MESA container associated with the computer in the office. Whitney and the Support Team epitomizes ONE ITS, where everyone is willing to work together to provide a seamless customer experience with minimal disruption to work. I appreciate everyone’s effort. I was up and running in no time!

Christina Crockett

Toni Mehrman

When ITS needed to renew Citrix licenses, it was Toni who reached out to us.She offered to contact the vendor for a renewal quote. Toni was aware that VDI is a goal outlined in the ITS Strategic plan. Toni didn’t just contact the vendor for a quote, she negotiated with them to honor the initial year of maintenance that we’d paid for. As a result of her actions, Toni saved ITS a chunk of change!

Thanks, Toni!!!!

Susan Kehoe

Whitney Sublett

For the second year in a row, ITS was the largest team in the walk. That doesn’t happen by accident. Whitney does an outstanding job of rallying the troops and encouraging folks to support this worthy cause. This year, our team particularly stood out thanks to Whitney’s handmade, one-of-a-kind team shirts. WE LOOKED AMAZEBALLS!!! Thank you, Whitney, for always ensuring ITS shines!!

Susan Kehoe

Whitney Sublett

I would like to nominate Whitney for a fantastic job with organizing ITS Group for the 2018 Victims Run with providing the enrolled participants with ONE ITS T-Shirts. With Whitney’s efforts you can see that she has a great deal of passion for the Victims events. Here efforts are very much appreciated and she got 39 of ITS folks to participate. Thanks Whitney. Great job and thanks for the T-Shirt. I am still wearing mine. ONE ITS.

Toni Mehrman

Whitney Sublett

On her own, Whitney took on organizing the ITS participation in the 5K and, out of her own pocket, create T-shirts for all of the employees that signed up in advance.

John Hanks

Denise Coates

Denise helped CVT (my office) fix a problem with someone else’s voicemail. We had requested multiple times to have said individual (and their telecom coordinator) to correct the issue, but it kept falling through the cracks. After explaining the lengthy history of the problem to Denise, she realized that this required a different approach. She fixed a problem plaguing us for over 2 years, within 1 day. Thank you soooo much Denise. You are an asset to Telecom Admin, NET, ITS and Mason as a whole.

Matthew Berlejung

Joe Balducci

CVT was connecting a brown bag VC meeting in JC 311 that needed content sharing. A disaster soon struck where after 2 laptops and a non-functioning in room computer would not play with the system. In walks Joe Balducci to connect to bluejeans and save the day by sharing the presenter’s powerpoint through the app. Not only that but when it lost connection, he went back in to reconnect. That is customer service with great results. Thank you Joe! Brava!!!

Cherie Galantis

Whitney Sublett

I’ve lost track of how many times Whitney has organized our team from ITS for this event. What started as an informal thing has morphed into the “expectation” that she’s just going to do it. For that we in ITS are sorry, for Whitney is a victim of her own success. After leading ITS to the largest participating team last year, she had to top that this year and went above and beyond by designing and painting T-shirts for our entire team and scheduling the photographer to take a great team photo, too.

Whitney knows what it takes to be successful. She took an idea and turned it into action all on her own and really took care of her co-workers in the process. And, she did this on her own time over multiple nights after work. For that we are always grateful, and we hope we never take it for granted.

Whitney ROCKS!

John Prette

Stephanie Werhane

Stephanie Werhane has been a full partner with Digital Communications on the Mason Drupal CMS enterprise integration. She’s a calm, guiding presence, answering a multitude of questions with patience and humor. She’s our go-to when issues pop up, from the peculiarly odd, to the user error (oops, my bad), to the “Mason’s home page is looking weird, and I don’t know why.” Her technical knowledge is always on display, but in a good way. She knows how things work, and what we need to do to make them not only work well, but to get the best result from a highly technical system. She acts with urgency when issues need to be addressed quickly, and takes the time to investigate an issue when she can. Stephanie is steady and persistent; she stays on an issue until the cause is discovered and a solution is found. She always makes a follow-up call or sends an email to make sure we’re good to go. And she never makes us feel stupid for not knowing something or not understanding it the first time. Digital Communications knows we can count on her, and we’d like to see that good work recognized.

Lisa Hitt

Mike Quigley

With constant moves and space allotment, we needed several office machines moved in order to provide work space for wage employees within our office space. Unfortunately the locations that were ideal to move this equipment had no nearby working data jacks. Mike was very instrumental in locating, extending and patching enough data ports and mini-hubs, in order to complete the task. This also included lending a hand in the actual moving of printer, fax machine and copiers. This action is not the normal task of an tss telecom installation technician. For this reason telecom administration staff is most grateful for the over and above customer service that Mike provided to complete our request and task. Many thanks to Mike Quigley for taking the time to talk to us about the issue we were having.

Telecom Administration staff

Jed Frye

Jed came to the rescue of Dr Stearns for an impromptu LIVE interview with the BBC over the pond. Not sure how many people were asked for assistance but no one could jump to the task. Lo and behold realizing that “Jed can do it,” we knew it was in good hands. Not only did he test with the BBC but Jed used his own phone with super camera powers to dazzle the audience at BBC wondering how such a quality camera exists on a phone. Thanks to Jed for going above and beyond once again! Kudos!

Cherie Galantis

Whitney Sublett

Whitney drove participation for the 2018 Victims’ Rights 5k Run/Walk through awareness and gentle prodding, picked up runner/walker packages, created ITSO/Person unique teeshirts. This was for a important cause, and it built a sense of community! Thanks, Whitney!

Curtis McNay

Whitney Sublett

Whitney not only organized the ‘ONE ITS’ group to join the Victim’s Walk but she also spent her time and money to make sure we had our individualized special t-shirts to own the ‘ONE ITS” motto. She made sure the group looked good and could be picked out of the crowd. That is dedication to both a cause and a team build as we were all PROUD of the work she did to make ITS stand tall. Thanks Whitney, you are the bestest!!!

Cherie Galantis

Whitney Sublett

Whitney has coordinated the Victims’ Rights 5k Run/Walk One ITS team for multiple years. She created T-Shirts for the team and ensured that all were registered and provided the gear required to participate. The team consisted of 39 participants and was acknowledged as the largest team with a donation totaling $780 to support Mason’s Victims’ of Violence Fund.

Whitney encouraged ITS participation, prepared multiple communications to ensure that all were continually informed of updates and followed-up after to inform all of the participation and results.She also replied promptly when participants inquired for answers to unknowns.

Mary Lulis

Whitney Sublett

Whitney, by herself, completely organized the One ITS Team in the 22nd Annual Victims’ Rights Run/Walk. Besides letting everyone know when and where to sign up she also made everyone on the team individualized shirts (Hand Made), organized a team photo, and picked up packet and event shirts for everyone. Because of all her hard work the ITS team was the largest of any other team on campus and helped make the event a success.

Rich Eggleton

Whitney Sublett

Whitney made custom t-shirts for the 2018 Victims’ Rights 5k Run/Walk using her own money on her own time. She epitomizes and embodies what ONE ITS is. We already had t-shirts the race had provided us, but to build team spirit, she made us t-shirts.

Christina Crockett

Matthew Berlejung

Matt really came through today for me and I cannot thank him enough! We had a difficult situation where we had 3 training workshops happening at the same time but due to a scheduling error there were only 2 rooms. Not only did Matt offer to find a location but he found a back up when that fell through. Furthermore, he reached out the University office that could make the reservation AND left a note for the trainer in the room. This is what we are all about, teamwork! Thanks Matt!

Joy Taylor

Lisa Carr

On Friday the week before day light savings Renate found that her calendar was an hour ahead in Outlook. Every event was showing 1 hour ahead. I emailed Lisa to let her know and she was able to super quick look it up and find that it was a reported Microsoft bug.
She was able to suggest using the “Day” view or “Work Week” view instead since those views did not have the 1 hour ahead problem. That work around was perfect and helped Renate significantly. She also didn’t realize there was a Work Week view, which she likes better since it doesn’t show Saturday and Sunday and is more concise anyway.

Typical Lisa, always being amazing.

I just wanted to thank her for helping me as well as the customer.

Jed Frye

Matt Berlejung

I love Matt’s ability to jump into a situation and take action… well sometimes it’s more like me dragging him into a situation. His customer service skills are amazing and I always love working with him because of his work ethic as well as his fun loving attitude.

Amber Hannush in the Provost let me know that she was having trouble with WebEx when she was hosting a meeting. When I went to her office she was able to show me that she wasn’t able to log into Shibboleth on the gmu.webex page. She swore she had an account, which she did, but it was with Cisco. So I sent an email to Matt to confirm.

Matt, being amazing as he always is, received the email and didn’t just say, “She doesn’t have an account.” He went above and beyond and filled out the WebEx account form for Amber and she had an account right then and there. I know Amber was super appreciative and that made ITS look awesome.

Amber does host quite a few meetings for large numbers of people for the Provost and will really love using the GMU WebEx because it will have a dial-in number, which Dr. Wu specifically requested so people don’t have to use the app if they don’t want to.

Thank you Matt!
Jed Frye

Rodrigo Alva

While waiting for class to begin in a Mason classroom, Rodrigo noticed that the instructor and a support personnel were having difficulties turning on the classroom system which began to cut into instructional time. Rodrigo spent time investigating the problem and luckily identified the issue soon thereafter. He then fixed the problem to the pleasure of his instructor, his fellow classmates, and the support personnel. They were all impressed with his knowledge and thankful that he was present in the room to resolve the problem.

Crystal Clemons

Charlite Allen, Joseph Coffin

Charlite and Joseph have been outstanding in their attention to the CHEM VC class in IN 131. We seem to have speakers that like to arrive late and that means that Charlite and Joseph have to wait to assist. Both techs are extremely patience and polite to the usually disheveled speaker that becomes more demanding by the minute. Of course the mac laptops don’t like to play but not to worry, Charlite and Joseph work through the issues, find a resolution and make everyone happy including CVT most of all. Kudos to such a great team of employees!

Cherie Galantis

Sean McNair and Emilio Goncalves

We set a very aggressive schedule for sending a large amount of hardware to surplus. Sean and Emilio helped meet this schedule with time to spare. They provided regular updates throughout the project. This project frees up many resources and space in the DataCenter. This will allow us to provide services to internal and external customers.

Sean and Emilio worked with a small team to accomplish this task. This equipment was heavy and difficult to work with and the team handled the task seamlessly.

Kenny Stewart

Rebecca Stone

Rebecca was such a rock star on this project! This was her first project leading an installation and she started this effort as if she is a professional in this area. Rebecca spent a lot of time with the Center for Academic Advising, Retention, and Transitions trying to understand their requirements for their conference room. She was patient and listened carefully. Over a series of meetings, she developed an understanding on how they were going to use the space and what “additions” might help them. She was very strategic in identifying opportunities to pull in experts if and when it was needed.

Rebecca developed such a great relationship with the customer. They could say no wrong about her or the system in which she provided them. Rebecca shared information on how to use the technology including tips and best practices. She also created an instructional guide for their continued use. She did a wonderful job!

Crystal Clemons