CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — Sixteen academic professionals and civil service staff members have received the Chancellor’s Staff Excellence Award recognizing exceptional performance at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. A CSEA committee recommends finalists, who are approved by Illinois Chancellor Robert Jones. Each awardee receives $1,500 and a commemorative award.
Two staff members received awards in each of the eight functional categories. The 2025 honorees, as described by their nominators:
Administrative and Public Engagement
Heather Murphy. Photo by Fred Zwicky
Since her promotion to the University Library’s first chief communications officer position in 2017, Heather Murphy has positively transformed the Library’s communications strategy. Her extensive accomplishments include creating award-winning communication campaigns as well as an array of tools, templates and resources to empower the Library’s many units to fulfill their unique priorities while maintaining cohesive messaging that meets international standards for digital accessibility.
She also leads the Library’s committee on strategic marketing, which supports library staff through seed grants and consultations in launching promotional products, events and activities that raise awareness of library services and programs.
Murphy has deftly navigated significant changes, from the evolution of social media to the challenges posed by the spread of disinformation. She has been at the forefront during critical moments, managing communications during the global pandemic, the Library’s internal discourse on systemic racism and an ambitious Library building project. Through all of this, her dedication to maintaining the Library’s trusted identity while staying responsive to broader cultural conversations has been vital to the Library’s resilience and success.
Sammer Jones, the director of global relations at Illinois International, oversees strategic global partnerships, manages complex international agreements and processes and fosters collaborations across the university’s academic, research and administrative sectors. Her proactive leadership ensures that tasks are completed with precision and efficiency while aligning with the university’s strategic goals.
She regularly takes on responsibilities beyond her formal role, including advocating for innovative initiatives such as the university’s first Global Staff Exchange. This program reflects her vision of creating a truly global university — not just for faculty and students but for the entire campus community. Her commitment to inclusivity has strengthened international engagement at every level, fostering professional growth for staff members through transformative cross-cultural learning experiences.
Whether managing comprehensive travel itineraries for university leaders or overseeing the global relations budget, Jones ensures that every project meets the highest standards of excellence. Her ability to inspire and mentor others underscores her exceptional contributions to international education and her steadfast commitment to institutional success.
Clerical Administrative Support
Jamie Evans, an administrative aide in animal sciences, wears many hats extending beyond her official administrative support role for the department head and select faculty members. Her extensive knowledge and her competent execution make her an invaluable resource for faculty, staff and students.
She is the go-to person for many of the critical issues related to the efficient running of the department, especially fielding questions that come up daily from students, faculty and staff. Evans serves as a linchpin in the administrative framework and — in all her responsibilities —displays an unusual level of initiative and creativity that significantly enhances the standing of the department.
What truly sets Evans apart is her kindness, compassion and exceptional interpersonal skills. She works exceptionally well with all individuals, fostering a collaborative and positive work environment.
Since beginning her tenure at Asian American studies in 2013, Christine Lyke has been both the department’s beating heart and one of its most precious assets.
She works directly with the department head to provide support on a variety of duties. These include assisting with all departmental organizational duties, fundraising activities, scheduling of events and guests, coordinating departmental committee activities, organizing major and minor recruitment, recording, drafting and disseminating departmental materials, supervising other staff and graduate teaching assistants and managing the budget. She also assists with curriculum needs and scheduling courses.
Lyke is involved in the department’s mission-critical functions and in activities that hold the community together, such as buying decorations and door prizes for holiday parties or ensuring that the department’s out-of-town guests know the places in town that can accommodate their dietary restrictions. In each of these duties, she demonstrates a level of excellence that surpasses what is required and exceeds all expectations.
Crafts and Trades
University Housing pipefitter Ryan Hausle is a very skilled technician who can troubleshoot and repair dining equipment with a variety of operating mechanics, electrical components, steam supply parts and plumbing aspects. He is a top-flight mechanic in every sense of the word.
Hausle has attended many classes to educate himself on the equipment he maintains. He also cross-trains other technicians to better understand dining repair activities to enable operations if he is unavailable. He will often come in early or stay late in the day to work around the dining center schedules. He provides exemplary service with minimal disruption to the overall dining operation and is always looking for way to improve efficiency and operation by addressing repairs as quickly as possible.
He is a trusted technician throughout Housing and has helped to establish a service that is second to none. The high level of service he provides, his character and his innovation provide a positive impact on the student experience.
Greg Moen is a supervisor of building craftspersons at Facilities & Services. He is responsible for managing a diverse workforce that maintains campus, a challenging position in which he excels. He knows how to motivate, he understands the value of relationships and customer service, and he is always responsive to leadership’s needs. He regularly and willingly takes on additional responsibilities to make F&S and the university better.
Moen demonstrates his professionalism and skills daily, but perhaps never more than when his role changed in a departmental reorganization. He became the manager of multiple shops (supervisors and individual team members) in the physical plant. His response was outstanding as he stayed motivated and motivated others. He took on the new role with enthusiasm and applied his technical, managerial and leadership skills well.
He advocates for educational outreach efforts with a focus on historically underrepresented populations. He regularly works with groups including area high schools, union halls, Parkland College and Education for Employment to educate youth on the opportunities and benefits of working in the trades and at the university. His professionalism, willingness to collaborate and outreach efforts place the university in a good light in the community.
Education/Extension/CITL
Laboratory manager Sherrie Lanzo is critical to the success of the Clinical Skills Learning Center in the College of Veterinary Medicine. One of her roles is to make sure that the CSLC has all the supplies it needs for teaching labs, models and exams.
She recognizes others’ achievements and when they are doing good work. She works hard to improve her skills and the abilities of others. As the employee who has worked in the CSLC the longest, she has been a great help to everyone in the unit. She is always willing to assist people in their new roles, from showing them how to do certain tasks to helping them in new labs and designing new units to teach the students.
She is always willing to lend her expertise on when and how things need to be done, especially to the new center director. Her experience and great work ethic have been invaluable. Her consistently high performance has increased productivity and improved veterinary student learning experiences in the anatomy laboratory settings and the CSLC.
Associate director for educational innovations Jamie Nelson’s expertise in generative AI, immersive technologies and emerging innovations has helped elevate the Center for Innovation in Teaching and Learning’s stature as a leader in cutting-edge education. His expertise is matched only by his dedication to collaboration and problem solving.
Beyond his technical acumen, Nelson is a very dedicated and reliable professional who consistently exceeds expectations. He is highly collaborative, frequently working across teams and disciplines to address complex challenges. He approaches every new task with enthusiasm and determination. Nelson truly has a solutions-oriented mindset that lends confidence in his colleagues. Whether offering transformative workshops, leading interdisciplinary projects or contributing to strategic initiatives, his performance is always outstanding and inspires those around him.
Nelson has been a strong advocate for offering internships to undergraduate students, providing them with hands-on experiences that enhance their employability. He helps bridge the gap between academic learning and professional application, thus fostering a unique culture of preparedness and adaptability that benefits both students and the university.
Information Technology
IT specialist Kenneth Patten is both the primary maintainer of the School of Earth, Society and Environment’s high-performance computing cluster system, called Keeling, and the primary provider of end-user support for the system. He is conscientious and doesn’t overlook details.
He is willing to put aside his other tasks to help anyone who is desperately trying to troubleshoot issues with code. After an initial consultation, Patten will send a code snippet along with a detailed response that pinpoints the precise cause of the problem, suggestions to avoid other potential problems he noticed along the way and maybe even a tip to help improve the performance of the code.
Dozens of graduate students have benefited directly from his efficient and thorough work. Patten’s efforts have aided many in ensuring their models run successfully, that their data is safe, and that they are able to be run software to analyze their data.
To say Michelle Rome has a number of balls in the air at one time is an understatement. As the associate director of information and data services in Applied Technologies for Learning in the Arts and Sciences, she leads several teams focused on data and reporting, application development and the ATLAS internship program, which she helped create. She is responsible for ATLAS communications and social media, including helping to deploy the ATLAS website. Across each of these areas, she performs at an extraordinary level.
As a manager, Rome always has effective suggestions to improve service and productivity, no matter the level of issue. She freely advises on strategy, technical direction, time management and ways to improve. For example, she prompted ATLAS Data Services to implement an access and permissions scheme for dashboards that fits the campus hierarchy, so that everyone from campus-level staff to department-level advisors can view a dashboard and see only the data that pertains to them.
She serves on many committees and is an active and creative voice for the role of data on this campus. She shares her college’s tools, coordinates educational brown bags and works through the broader lens of a university employee by advocating for solutions that benefit the whole.
Research
Crop sciences research agronomist Darin Joos leads the state of Illinois variety testing program, which evaluates the performance of commercial varieties of major crops grown in the state as a service to farmers and the seed industry. Joos maintains trials at 14 locations for corn, wheat and soybean, requiring weeks of travel and extensive time commitments during spring, summer and fall.
Joos also devotes significant time to serving individual researchers engaged in research at the Crop Sciences Research and Education Center, which he currently manages. He assists professors, researchers, students and representatives in Extension and industry with their field research needs. He is responsible for obtaining, maintaining and coordinating all the equipment and materials as well as keeping the buildings at the farms in good order.
Under his leadership, the research farm staff has developed a productive culture of communication and collaboration that has improved service for faculty researchers using the farm. It has also improved job satisfaction among the farm staff, helping to bolster retention and collegiality.
Illinois State Geological Survey associate research scientist Eric Plankell serves as a co-principal investigator for the Nature Preserves Program and as a project manager on Illinois Department of Transportation and Illinois Tollway contracts. He is responsible for managing sites, collecting data in the field and office, understanding geochemical data and trends, and writing reports for a multitude of agencies.
He performs additional tasks due to his wide array of expertise, including managing field equipment and making purchases, training new staff and interns, writing essential reports, going on field campaigns and performing in-house management and data tasks across all his projects. He is integral in planning the “Naturally Illinois Expo,” a Prairie Research Institute event that initially began with ISGS efforts.
He reliably executes all his duties with excellence while being thoughtful, considerate and supportive of others. Further, he is a willing and enthusiastic mentor to new staff, interns and students.
Service and Maintenance
Associate director of utilities production Mike Larson provides a considerable amount of time and effort dealing with utility issues so that the campus is not impacted. He is a driving force at Facilities & Services and is trusted, reliable and respected by everyone he encounters.
He initiated a training program that has developed employees internally for more complex duties, resulting in promotional opportunities for the entire staff. He has championed F&S to develop more robust safety training and initiated a program that has become the standard for the entire staff.
He works across department and division lines to create a customer-centric relationship. He helps identify opportunities for customers to utilize the services of F&S and helps them lower their cost of utilities to their buildings. He is a leader in the areas of carbon reduction, finding every possible opportunity to improve on the carbon footprint of the campus. Larson was instrumental in the efforts that resulted in the university receiving the highest award for district energy operations, both commercial and institutional.
He helped develop a public affairs effort at Abbott Power Plant to introduce the campus and surrounding community to the plant, which was long thought to be an off-limits area. He has helped develop this organization into a truly professional team.
Building operations coordinator Manuel Makowski took the initiative to redesign the Illini Union building operations training for full-time and graduate student employees. In doing so, he applied best practices from his deep experience in both food service building operations to create a training pedagogy that addresses the variety of learning styles of a diverse workforce. Thus, employees are provided a variety of visual, audible and hands-on tools that assist them in learning and retaining work-related information.
He routinely works outside of scheduled business hours to ensure emergent issues in daily operations are addressed immediately and communicated within the team and to senior management. This has fostered a greater sense of support and confidence amongst frontline staff who may be dealing with unpleasant or challenging situations in the building.
He is a consummate event professional, providing superior inspections of room and multimedia setups for events both prior to and during the event to ensure customer delight. Colleagues and clients alike respect and admire Makowski for his integrity and the high standards he upholds in every interaction. He has greatly contributed to the overall positive perception of the service units.
Student Services
College of Agricultural Consumer and Environmental Sciences assistant dean of academic affairs Brianna Gregg consistently expands on her responsibilities and executes all her tasks at a high level.
Her work never falls short of being thorough, thoughtful and comprehensive. Her wide array of responsibilities ranges from oversight of the ACES academic advising team to coordinating New Student Convocation, from supporting the timely processing of forms and petitions to serving as an expert to departmental leadership on program change proposals. Her expansive network of colleagues and friends ensure that problems or tasks that fall outside her area of expertise never remain undone for long; she is able to bring in experts from across campus to provide the guidance and approval needed to keep the ball rolling on projects and workflows that influence the experience of students and the activities of faculty and staff.
Gregg’s work with outreach, scholarship administration and admissions regularly places her in spaces with the broader Illinois state public. She presents the transformative research and teaching occurring in ACES with enthusiasm and depth of understanding, passionately conveying how the university is changing lives and improving the state of Illinois.
In the Graduate College, assistant dean for admissions and enrollment Beth Spark excels in the management of crucial day-to-day operations and has built a national reputation as a top leader. Over the past decade, she has managed dramatic increases in graduate applications and admissions while maintaining high standards of service and efficiency.
Spark’s impact extends far beyond Illinois, as she actively shares her expertise with colleagues at peer institutions. She was appointed to the National Association for Graduate Admissions Professionals’ Education Committee, where she helps plan educational activities for members, including the annual conference and professional development events. Her collaborative approach to peer development has enhanced the overall quality of graduate education across multiple institutions while strengthening professional relationships between universities.
Her most notable achievement is the development of the “enrolled student module” within Slate, which is revolutionizing how the university manages student information and communications. Her exceptional talent for building consensus and fostering collaboration has created a workplace where every team member feels valued and motivated to excel. She approaches every challenge with creativity and determination, while never losing sight of the human element. Her leadership style inspires loyalty and dedication, resulting in a cohesive team that consistently achieves remarkable results.
