The Operating Staff Council (OSC) ended summer on a high note with the annual StaffFest employee appreciation event on Aug. 4. Over 650 civil service and extra help employees attended.
This year some new features were added to the festivities including outdoor games and a dunk tank. Eight volunteers generously offered to sit in the tank including Executive Vice President and Provost Lisa Freeman; Chris McCord, dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences; Tammi Pulak, building services supervisor; Al Phillips, vice president of administration and finance; Brad Bond, dean of the Graduate School; Nick Myers, waiter at the Holmes Student Center; Tom Viel, director of the physical plant; and Bill Pitney, associate dean for research, resources and innovation in the College of Education. Proceeds went to the OSC’s Operating Staff Dependent Endowed Scholarship – over $300 was raised with an additional $45 matching donation from one of the dunk tank participants.
As a kickoff to the OSC Employee Morale Committee’s focus on staff wellness this year, each employee who attended received a water filtration pitcher which was generously donated by MAVEA Water Filtration, the employer of 2011 NIU alum Jesse Liska. Three hundred and sixty pitchers were also donated to the Huskies Student Food Pantry. The food pantry also received $25 in monetary donations and 60 pounds of food from StaffFest attendees.
A 50/50 raffle was also held to raise money for the dependent scholarship; Patricia Maxwell from the College of Engineering and Engineering Technology was the winner. Last year, OSC was able to award three operating staff dependents $1000 each for the 2016-17 academic year.
This year’s StaffFest Planning Committee included Nancy Brown (chair), Elizabeth Buck, Patricia Liberty-Baczek, Victoria Nay, Pamela Pittman and Karen Smith. The council would like to thank everyone who attended and participated in StaffFest 2016.
