On Jan. 31, the ORED team gathered at Sun Valley Lanes for its annual staff recognition event. Many thanks to Laurie Sampson and Lisa Maupin for breathing new life into the event this year! In addition to reflecting on our successes from 2019, we had a relaxing afternoon of bowling, trivia, snacks and socializing. We appreciate their hard work and diligent preparation to ensure a smooth, well-coordinated event.
Below you’ll find each unit’s 2019 accomplishments, a listing of this year’s award winners and links to kudos and photos from the event.
2019 TEAM ACCOMPLISHMENTS
Every year, each unit submits a list of its top achievements. Here are the 2019 successes your ORED colleagues are most proud of:
Vice Chancellor’s Office
- Continued our upward trajectory of research activity with an all-time high research proposals and awards.
- Opening of Cherish Nebraska at Morrill Hall in February 2019. Cherish Nebraska has had a large positive impact on the community. The Museum achieved a landmark 100,598 visitors, a new record, during fiscal year 2019.
- University of Nebraska Press’s “January Children” by Safia Elhillo, a poetry book in a series edited by Kwame Dawes, was featured on the Today Show.
- Welcomed and celebrated new leadership: Assistant Vice Chancellor Nathan Meier (welcome back!) and Director of Sponsored Programs David Doty.
- 2019 was a record year for the University of Nebraska-Lincoln with six National Science Foundation CAREER Award winners: Joe Louis, Toshihiro Obata, Rebecca Roston, Michael Sealy, Rebecca Wachs and Limei Zhang.
Office of Sponsored Programs
- Pre-award submitted 2,100 proposals in FY 2019, totaling nearly $738 million.
- The Awards team administered 1,172 grants, contracts and cooperative agreements, bringing in more than $184 million in new awards to UNL.
- Post-Award set up 1,759 new WBS numbers and closed out 1,365 projects. Staff worked on development and training for the new Project Verification Statement training.
- Earned clean audits with no findings from the Uniform Guidance Single Audit and agency-specific desk audits from NSF and the Office of Naval Research.
- OSP processed more than 11,000 Personnel Activity Reports.
Office of Proposal Development
- Served more than 200 faculty who submitted more than 230 proposals to federal and private sponsors.
- Delivered ORED’s annual CAREER Award workshop and NSF CAREER Award Club.
- Delivered the Research Development Fellows Program.
- Escorted more than 20 faculty to Washington, D.C., to meet with program officers.
- Supported three site visits and a blue ribbon panel.
- Distributed Funding Announcements to more than 1,400 UNL faculty, administrators, staff and students.
Research Compliance Services
- IRB team: You’ve survived the first year of the changes to the Common Rule and made the innumerable updates to our policies, procedures and systems look easy! With an eye on continual improvement, the IRB team is ready to prepare for the 2020 site visit from the Accreditation of Human Research Protection Programs!
- Emily Hanus: The University of Michigan, in addition to numerous other universities, heavily borrowed her webpage template for foreign influence do’s and don’ts. She is also prepped and ready to go for much-needed changes to the Interest Disclosure process!
- Lissette Gilster: Completed her second national-level Association of University Export Control Officers presentation and is working on a committee for identifying the best shipping platform for the whole campus!
- Export Control team: Major focus on program systems and standard operating procedures documentation as the team expands. With an ever-changing landscape of controls (sometimes daily), this is not an easy feat to undertake and accomplish!
- Rachel Wenzl: Presented at the University of Nebraska Medical Center Hot Topics in the Protection of Human Subjects annual conference and at the national Public Responsibility in Medicine and Research conference with colleagues from Indiana and Wisconsin!
- Jenn Klein: Presented at the UNMC Hot Topics in the Protection of Human Subjects Research annual conference and is working through automated metrics solutions for our IRB webpage!
- IRB Metrics team: As a result of the great work in 2019, the IRB Metrics team — Rachel Wenzl, Jenn Klein and Seth Burkey — recently had a poster accepted to the AAHRPP 2020 conference. The poster focused on the automated real-time IRB metrics process at UNL.
- Becky Freeman: Created some of our first “how-to” videos on submitting IRB applications and common questions in NUgrant to better assist our PIs! She has overseen all project transitions into the new regulatory requirements flawlessly and efficiently for our PIs!
- Winter Daniels: She just joined the RCS team (IRB and Export Control) in September and has made it through the first few months of training – keep up the good work in 2020!
Research Communications
- Hired Dan Moser and Heidi Uhing as communications specialists.
- Coordinated and executed communications and public relations efforts for 12 Nebraska Lectures.
- Saw readership growth for Research News and gained new followers across all social channels.
- Co-hosted the first-ever Research Media Day with University Communication.
- Implemented rebranding efforts for Nebraska Research Days.
- Story packages produced by Research Comm were used by local and national media outlets.
- Produced an updated marketing video for the Nebraska Center for Energy Sciences Research.
- Received kudos on the N150 edition of the annual Research Report.
Research Finance and Information Systems
- Reconciled 1,862 P-card transactions.
- Oversaw payroll and time entry for 305 individuals.
- Reconciled 279 cost centers and grants.
- Purchased 3,857 gift cards for faculty use for research participants.
- Assisted with budgeting and submitting 50 grants.
- Provided business services and support to eight research centers/programs. This includes our newest assignment of managing finance at the University of Nebraska State Museum.
- Hired and trained one new staff member.
- Reviewed/approved 429 travel request/expense reports.
- Built a dashboard to assist with the new Responsibility Centered Management reporting.
- Assisted RCS office with simplifying its AAHRPP reporting.
- Assumed support responsibility for NUgrant and NURAMP.
- Worked with IRB to build public-facing, interactive metrics reports.
- Fielded 22 ASAP, ad hoc data requests that helped people with surveys, data quality, invite lists and decision-making.
Institutional Animal Care Program
- IACP administrative staff collaborated with research faculty resulting in being listed as a co-author(s) on four peer-reviewed papers.
- Large animal research numbers have tripled over the last five years.
- Significantly increased IACP Service Center income during the last five years, with the primary source being technical support.
- Broke ground on the 10,000-square-foot gnotobiotic facility addition to the Life Sciences Annex.
- Received funding to purchase our microCT machine and conducted training.
- The biosafety level 3 laboratory is officially certified and staff trained.
- IACP hosted another successful Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee training with IACUCs from the Nebraska College of Technical Agriculture, UNMC, University of Nebraska Kearney, Huvepharma, Zoetis and the Lincoln Children’s Zoo in attendance.
- IACP staff attended training sessions in Minneapolis, Denver, Memphis, San Diego and Raleigh, and hosted 10 animal care seminars for animal care technicians across campus and a PI training for all faculty conducting research at UNL.
- IACP staff, in collaboration with faculty PIs, successfully bred and farrowed transgenic pigs.
- IACP Service Center technicians assisted with over 90 surgical cases.
- IACP hosted Biomedical Research Awareness Day and received more than 70 signatures in support of research.
Industry Relations
- Record industry income to UNL and record industry-sponsored awards to UNL.
- In collaboration with OSP, the Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources and Business and Finance, implemented new policies and processes associated with sponsored service and testing agreements, specifically those with industry sponsors.
- Grew ORED’s industry engagement team with the hiring of Kimberly Peschka Bilder.
- Contributed to the development of the Combine AgriFood Incubator at Nebraska Innovation Campus, working with the Nebraska Innovation Campus Development Corporation team to recruit new NIC tenant partners.
- Supported the College of Engineering with development of a multidisciplinary capstone program, and the Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering with a capstone contracting process.
NUtech Ventures
- Evaluated 112 new invention disclosures.
- Filed 87 U.S., Patent Cooperation Treaty and foreign patents and 74 patents were granted, including 35 issued U.S. patents.
- In 2018, the University of Nebraska system ranked in the top 100 academic institutions worldwide for issued U.S. patents.
- Executed 31 new technology license agreements.
- Generated $6.1 million in license revenue, with $4.7 million being distributed to inventors and campus.
- Partnered with the College of Engineering to sponsor the inaugural Engineering Pitch Competition.
- Hosted more than 25 campus events to promote technology commercialization, intellectual property education and entrepreneurship.
- Hired and trained NUtech’s sixth cohort of commercialization interns. Since 2014, NUtech has provided this opportunity to 51 students from seven UNL colleges.
Nebraska Innovation Campus
- Companies/entities located at NIC funded 97 student internships.
- NIC Conference Center reported 39,111 participants at events during 187 days.
- NIC is home to more than 50 diverse private and public partners.
- The Combine, a new space at NIC dedicated to helping agriculture and food-related companies, opened in October 2019. Invest Nebraska and the Nebraska Department of Economic Development are providing support as founding partners. Several private and public entities have also pledged their support.
- Nebraska Innovation Studio, the makerspace at NIC, secured funding and completed the buildout of a classroom, metal shop and wood shop.
- Nebraska Innovation Studio hit record attendance in 2019, topping 350 active members. More than 2,000 students, faculty, staff, alumni and community members have accessed NIS since it opened in October 2015.
- More than $20.69M in research contracts and awards were made to university faculty and projects located on NIC during the last fiscal year.
AWARDS
Each year, the Vice Chancellor’s Award for Invaluable Service is presented to ORED employees and partners who have exhibited excellent work and commitment to the department’s mission. Award criteria include outstanding accomplishments above and beyond job and performance expectations; actions that support leadership, innovation, initiative and/or cost-effectiveness; and exceptional service provided to university clients.
The 2019 Vice Chancellor’s Award for Invaluable Service are:
- Megan Ebbers, Institutional Animal Care Program
- Emily Hanus, Research Compliance Services
- Jeewan Jyot, NUtech Ventures
- Lisa Maupin, Events and Outreach
- Kathy Partlow, Office of Proposal Development
- Mark Riley, College of Engineering
In addition, the Events and Outreach/Research Communications teams (Joel Brehm, Tiffany Lee, Lisa Maupin, Dan Moser, Laurie Sampson, Ashley Washburn and Heidi Uhing) were awarded the Vice Chancellor’s Cup for Outstanding Customer Service during the event.
Congratulations to all!
KUDOS
ORED staff are invited to submit kudos to their colleagues that are rotated on screen during the staff recognition event. To view this year’s slideshow, click here.
PHOTOS
Photos from the staff recognition event are available here.
