Engineering Staff Award of Excellence
The purpose of this award is to foster excellence in the workplace by rewarding and recognizing staff, unclassified professional and university support, who achieve excellence and/or make exemplary contributions to the mission and values of K-State and the Carl R. Ice College of Engineering through service as a team player, exceptional productivity, creativity or innovation, distinguished accomplishment, and/or leadership.
Eligibility and criteria
All unclassified professional and university support staff members with a minimum of three years of continuous service, who are employed at a five-tenths or greater regular or term appointment, shall be eligible for the award.
Nominees are eligible for a maximum of one award in an application year, and awardees receive a $1,000 cash prize. An employee may receive this award only once every five years.
Staff may be nominated using the following areas of accomplishment. Additional information is provided on the nomination form (docx).
- Team building, group activity, service to the university
Participation in a cooperative/collaborate setting promotes teamwork, effective delegation, and attainment of the charge or goal of the group. The staff member is recognized as a valuable team player that engages others, works toward consensus, considers opinions from a diverse team and enhances teamwork. - Productivity, creativity, innovation
Increases in work productivity, and/or new or improved processes or services that result from the employee's contributions. The staff member contributes through creative effort — program development, marketing, use of technology, or other accomplishments — that yields significant benefit for their unit, the campus or the larger community. - Distinguished accomplishment
An event or achievement that is significant in scope, effort or impact. The employee's efforts lead to notable recognition and/or benefit for Kansas State University, its employees, students, or its constituents, including citizens of the state of Kansas. - Leadership
Leadership of a unit, department or university organization that has made a distinct and positive impact. The employee has implemented significant, positive changes or improvements and/or led in a way that models and fosters an excellent team environment.
Current recipients
Mandy Smith and Cathleen Stotts
This year’s recipients are Mandy Smith, graphic designer and Cathleen Stotts, budget/fiscal coordinator, both in the College of Engineering.
- Over the past few years, Smith has completely redesigned the recruitment materials for the college. She has taken ideas and goals from the recruitment office and translated those into digital and print pieces that are seen by thousands of people throughout the year.
- Through her creativity, innovation and graphics expertise, Smith has also made a significant impact on the college’s research productivity. Her willingness to engage with faculty and develop graphics for numerous proposals has been instrumental in securing competitive research funding.
- Stotts has built a great relationship with many in Human Resources and is always one of the first names that comes to mind when gathering information from HR liaisons. Cathleen’s experience and exceptional knowledge of processes and procedures stand out from the crowd.
- As the president of Teachers and Employees Association, or TEA, of K-State, she has been essential to the improvements in efficiency TEA realized after HR reduced support. This has resulted in TEA becoming budget neutral for the first time, which in turn ensures the stability of the organization to serve the K-State community in perpetuity.