This year’s annual Employee Luncheon was held on Tuesday, Dec. 17. In addition to good food, good fellowship, and good fun, the luncheon served as an opportunity to hear about important campus updates and honor hard-working individuals.
Winners were named in UMPI’s “Deck the Halls” door decorating contest (see Door Decorating for the story and photos). In the Ugly Sweater Contest, Cybersecurity professor Fred Strickland was the crowd favorite in his Santa shirt, though Jon Ouellette from Admissions gave him a run for his money in his full elf costume.
The Nan Amodeo Staff Award was also presented, and all nominees were recognized. Established by Professor Emerita of English Nan Amodeo, who taught at UMPI from 1967 to 1998, the annual award recognizes an UMPI staff member for his or her outstanding service to the University. In particular, the award recognizes hourly employees, whom Amodeo felt were too often “unpraised members” of the UMPI community. She felt that their dedication deserved appropriate recognition. Nominees must have 5 or more years of service to the institution and be nominated by a peer or other member of the UMPI community. There were 13 nominees and this year’s award was presented to Daren Green who works in IT. Congratulations, Daren!
The event also included a SERVICE Rewards marshmallow tossing activity, a raffle to benefit the UMPI Campus Food Pantry, and the annual auctioning of the Owls sculpture replica created by Al Levesque. The sculpture will reside this year in Shara Page’s office area (thanks for being a good sport, President Rice). Look for photos of all the fun on UMPI’s facebook page.
