Current Features

Jen Fleischman was breathing a sigh of relief the morning of Nov. 10.

That would prove to be temporary.

The director of the Department of Emergency Management on USF’s Tampa campus, Fleischman and her team had been monitoring Hurricane Eta as it devastated parts of Central America and then moved west across the Caribbean Sea as a tropical storm.

By that Tuesday morning, the storm was forecast to pass to the west of Tampa Bay as it moved north through the Gulf of Mexico. By Wednesday morning, Nov. 11 – Veterans Day – Eta had changed direction, placing the Tampa Bay region under a tropical storm warning.

It was at that point that Fleischman activated a joint Emergency Operations Center (EOC) involving USF’s campuses in Tampa, St. Petersburg and Sarasota-Manatee. In addition to a skeleton crew in the physical EOC on the Tampa campus, a full EOC involving about 120 individuals from 30-40 departments was conducted virtually due to the coronavirus pandemic. The fact that the university was closed for Veterans Day was not lost on Fleischman.

“The core emergency response team has been working so hard to manage COVID-19, and folks really needed that day off,” she said. “No one complained when they were asked to work on Veterans Day. Everyone was ready and people responded when asked. But folks could have used that break.”

A core “ride-out” team remained on the Tampa campus through the night into Thursday, monitoring the storm and conditions on USF’s campuses. Damage assessment teams arrived at each campus on Thursday morning, and operations in the EOC ended late that afternoon. Despite the heavy rains and gusty winds, USF and the region were largely spared.

“The close partnerships across our campuses that have been leveraged since consolidation helped to ensure consistent and swift communication during both response and recovery operations,” Fleischman said, referring to the consolidation of USF’s three campuses under a single accreditation earlier this year.

In addition to monitoring storms during a very active 2020 hurricane season and handling other regular responsibilities, Emergency Management has worked with USF’s COVID-19 Task Force and Recovery Support Functions since the spring to manage the response to the pandemic. That has included critical individuals coordinating a variety of activities, including finances, wellness, housing, planning, facilities, student success, academic continuity, research, technology and communications.

“The fact that so many individuals were willing to give up a well-deserved day off as Tropical Storm Eta approached is a testament to their dedication to the health and safety of the USF community,” President Steve Currall said. “The coordination between our campuses was essential and again demonstrated how well we work together as One USF.”

Preparing USF’s campuses for the limited return this fall of students, faculty and staff required a herculean effort by the Office of Administrative Services’ nearly 450 employees. Some of the numbers help tell their story:

• Signage – decals, table tents and barricade tape – had to be designed and purchased. As just two examples, more than 31,000 decals were installed and 2,000 table tents distributed across the three campuses.
  
  
• 29 hand sanitizer vending machines were installed to provide two complimentary 4-ounce bottles of spray hand sanitizer every 30 days to students, faculty and staff.
  
  
• 800 SaniKits were assembled and distributed for use in centralized employee areas, such as breakrooms, offices and other employee spaces. The SaniKits include spray bottles of disinfectant, paper towels and gloves.
  
  
• More than 75,000 washable, reusable face coverings and nearly 46,000 disposable masks have been distributed to departments and units for use by students, faculty and staff.
  
  
• Nearly 700 classrooms, meeting spaces and informal gathering spaces were analyzed and reconfigured for physical distancing. Ninety new outdoor seating areas were created across the campuses.
  
  
• 900 plexiglass partitions – a total length of just over half a mile – were installed.

The work did not stop once the fall semester began. For example, hand sanitizer vending machines have to be restocked regularly. And the frequency of enhanced cleaning and disinfecting of high-touch surfaces – such as tables, doorknobs, light switches, countertops, handles, desks and sinks – has been increased as part of the ongoing efforts to mitigate the spread of COVID-19.

Administrative Services consists of Facilities Management, Parking & Transportation Services, the Administrative Services Business Center and the Communications team.

Johnny El-Rady
Instructor III
Department of Cell Biology, Microbiology and Molecular Biology

A member of the faculty since 1997, Johnny has truly gone “above and beyond” during this pandemic. In April, he led a USF task force charged with helping move STEM labs online. These labs involve special equipment, materials and hands-on interactions, and so are among the most difficult courses to transition to online learning. The task force successfully scaled media-rich innovative virtual STEM labs and became a go-to-resource for other State University System institutions. Johnny also launched fundraising efforts for his native Lebanon, whose capital city Beirut had experienced the largest non-nuclear explosion in history. In addition, he postponed his professional development leave from fall 2020 to spring 2021 to continue to assist with online instruction. He then postponed that leave to fall 2021, at the request of his department chair, to help teach upper-level courses during the upcoming spring semester.

Grandon Gill
Professor, School of Information Systems and Management
Founding Director, Doctor of Business Administration program

At the outset of the COVID-19 crisis, when students and faculty were told to stay away from the campuses and conduct their classes online, Grandon assembled a team of tech-savvy business educators and offered mentoring for the rest of the faculty. His efforts paid off. A lot could have gone wrong during the transition to 100-percent online education, but the business faculty, with the assistance of Grandon and his team, provided a seamless bridge from face-to-face teaching to computer-to-computer education. In recognition of these efforts, Provost Ralph Wilcox named Grandon a Faculty Champion and he will represent the Muma College of Business on the USF Faculty Instruction and Learning Excellence Development Team.

Le’Shelle Davis
Application Document Processor, Graduate Recruitment
Graduate Affairs Office

Le’Shelle has been a true hero for the Graduate Affairs office during the past several months, adapting to a new environment while never missing a beat in her stellar work ethic. She quietly and steadily took on additional programs in her applicant-tracking system, deftly adding them to her growing portfolio. In total, she tracked 1,105 applications for fall 2020 compared to 729 for fall 2019. When USF’s St. Petersburg campus admission operations consolidated in the Tampa office, two graduate programs dropped into tracking limbo. Le’Shelle made it her mission to ensure that no applicants fell through the cracks. She served as a sounding board for students who feared this would end their dream of a graduate degree and explained that USF would welcome them in the spring if the fall semester was logistically not an option.

Raman Sachdev
Instructor

Raman, MA ’15 and PhD ’19, is an instructor in the philosophy department who also teaches an Honors Acquisition of Knowledge (AOK) course.

Honors students take AOK during their first semester on campus. In this class they explore the different ways in which knowledge is created and consumed. Raman was not scheduled to teach a summer AOK course, but volunteered to rearrange his schedule and teach one to help the university determine how to best handle in-person instruction during the pandemic. In his summer “pilot” course, half of his class was in the classroom with him (socially distanced and wearing masks), and half joined synchronously using the Microsoft Teams platform. This was a new way of teaching, and Raman quickly adapted to offer a safe and impactful experience for all of his students. He tested new technology for the university and provided valuable feedback to shape the instruction plan for the fall semester. He also helped train other faculty members to ensure the best possible experience.

In addition to this important work in the pilot course, Raman is now teaching AOK at both the St. Petersburg and Sarasota-Manatee campuses.

COVID Care Team

USF’s impressive efforts to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 have included a quick and efficient isolation process for students who test positive with COVID-19 or have been exposed to someone with the virus.

Students in isolation in the residence halls are assigned a point of contact from the COVID Care Team. This group of more than 50 staff members has volunteered to support residents during their time in isolation. The assigned staff member virtually checks in with the student soon after they arrive in the isolation space and continues to touch base frequently to assess their needs and provide support.

The COVID Care Team members all volunteered their time to support residents in isolation and have been working tirelessly this semester to provide individualized assistance to these students.

Housing Assignments Team

David Kloiber, Kim McCabe,
Kali Popson, ’17, Amy Pounders

Led by David Kloiber, associate director for operations and outreach, the Assignments Team of USF Housing & Residential Education has worked tirelessly throughout the pandemic. Since March, the team has answered thousands of calls and e-mails from residents and families regarding the housing changes implemented in response to COVID-19. From coordinating room changes to implementing grand opening, the team has not taken a break from giving 110 percent to supporting USF residents during this time of uncertainty.

Library Services Desk

They are likely the first people you meet at the Tampa campus library, friendly faces behind the front desk who check out items, answer questions and reveal a service or resource you never knew existed. It’s a diverse team, called the Library Services Desk, and they do exactly that, provide a multitude of library services.

Led by Terry Hutchings, ’16, manager of operations, and managed by Loryn Ragsdale, library operations manager, the team puts dynamic practices into place that ensure a safe, healthy environment for the USF community. Their team includes Building & Security Assistants Patrick Crookston and Matt McDonough,’01, who have been at the building daily since COVID-19 sent most employees and students home in March. Their reliability and attention to detail are never in short supply, whether it’s processing and shipping hundreds of laptops to students and books to faculty, or monitoring the building for cleanliness and safety. Library Assistant Ginny Gates-Fowler, ’06 and MA ’08, Life Member, re-launched Uborrow book loaning this fall, and Tina Pierson, ’18, monitors patron emails and retrieves requested materials for faculty and students. Scott Hicks, ’95, Austin Thommas,’18, Sarah Grecni and Andre Holmes are library specialists. When not on the desk, Scott extends due dates and assists patrons with account issues. Andre monitors the Laptop Loaner Program, providing laptops to students in need to help them continue their studies remotely. Sarah and Austin work with the Course Reserves and Textbook Affordability Project to ensure students have in-person access to course materials that are affordable, up-to-date and satisfy their academic needs. Teresa Higdon, ’01 and MA ’10, and Jeff Hadsock, ’13, are library operations supervisors and work closely with staff and students ensuring the front desk runs smoothly and patrons gain access to the materials they need. Stephanie Mackin, stacks supervisor, helped create the LibCal Seat Reservation system, which allows students to safely study in the building while following physical distancing standards. Along with her Stacks student employees, Deandre, Samantha, Ishama, Maleena, Sarah, Jordan and Quentin, she also organized a new system to ensure that books are sanitized and safe for all to browse and handle.

Outside of Stacks, the Services Desk also employs students. Alex has been a huge help to the TAP/Course reserve team, stickering and shifting books to make room for the newest editions of textbooks. Sofia, Demara and Kaley have assisted with Uborrow requests and placed QR codes on almost 800 study spaces, allowing students to safely check in and out of their reserved seats. Cesar and Tyler have tirelessly walked the floors every shift to ensure everyone is wearing masks. And Jessica, Skyya and Daisy have assisted patrons from the library concierge desk located in the middle of the first-floor lobby, allowing for further safe physical distancing.

Amanda Boczar
Operations Manager

Sydney Jordan, ’15
Collections Specialist

Special collections is full of wondrous and rare materials including photographs and stories of LGBTQ+ and Civil Rights activism in Tampa Bay, environmental data from Audubon Florida and so much more. Special Collections is a way to look back through history as a means to move forward. Amanda and Sydney bring these unique resources to life.

They have been instrumental in developing virtual resources that enhance access to traditionally print special collections. Their extensive work creating online sites to facilitate research, discovery and classroom instruction during the pandemic has transformed the USF community’s interaction and engagement with materials. Using distinctive primary resources to build virtual collection hubs and online learning modules, Amanda and Sydney effectively demonstrate the value of Special Collections in meeting both the immediate and the long-term needs and interests of researchers, educators and students on campus and abroad.

Samyntha Francis
Assistant Director of Academic Affairs

David Naar
Associate Dean of Academic Affairs

Samyntha “Sami” Francis and David Naar operate as a kind of Leia and Luke at the College of Marine Science – relentlessly shining their light to improve processes and morale during tough times while fighting off any dark forces of confusion or isolation. Sami doesn’t just do her job, she serves her community. One student struggling with grief this year said Sami called her up every two weeks to check in and provide a “non-judgmental, safe voice of reason” – making all the difference in this student’s ability to succeed. When the pandemic hit, David also stepped up – providing information and support around the clock. When the visa status of international students was uncertain, he worked tirelessly with USF administration to find a solution while keeping the college community informed every step of the way. He is also known to routinely attend – and really be present for – every single “Diversi-teas” conversation run as part of the mentoring culture at the college; these address everything from racism to imposter syndrome. Students know he doesn’t have to do that – but showing up matters, especially now.

Gary Mitchum
Associate Dean

The pandemic took root as the college was hiring a new dean, making life more hectic than usual for Associate Dean (then Interim Dean) Gary Mitchum. Gary’s cool demeanor introduced calm through the frenzy of new information, COVID-19 related protocols and leadership transition. His daily walk-throughs among campus buildings have been a welcome comfort, and his profound commitment to student success is celebrated. When COVID hit, many students felt their research and career paths ground to a halt.

Oceanography careers often depend upon spending time at sea but cruises stopped for months, and COVID disrupted the rhythm of lab work. But, said one student, the fact is that progress has NOT stopped thanks to Gary’s fierce, if quiet, work behind the scenes, often late into the night. He’s kept protocols clear and safe. This student was able to safely embark on a critical research cruise in Tampa Bay with Gary’s help, “and you can probably multiply my experience by about 100 over the past six months,” he said. Perhaps fitting for this ocean physicist, while COVID exerted all of its forces of oppression on the typical life of a graduate student, Gary was on the other side of the equation, providing the necessary opposing forces of calm, cool action to ensure momentum in careers and livelihoods.

Kami Kim
Professor and Director of Division of Infectious Disease and International Medicine, Department of Internal Medicine

As the world watched COVID-19 infection rates grow, physicians and researchers scrambled to find effective treatments. Dr. Kami Kim was on the frontline for USF Health and Tampa General Hospital at the start of the pandemic and quickly helped review, evaluate and launch more than 20 clinical trials that tested medications we all hoped would ease the severe and life-threatening reactions patients experience with this virus. In March, she was awarded USF Health/TGH’s very first COVID trial: an anti-IL6 (anti-inflammatory cytokine) drug, funded by Regeneron. With her breadth of knowledge for infectious diseases as a medical doctor and her accomplished career as a basic science researcher, she continues to help coordinate trials. Her efforts have included trials for Remdesivir, dexamethasone, Regeneron, hydroxychloroquine, among many others – work that is providing much-needed data that will tell the world what works and what is ineffective for fighting this virus. Across the pandemic, she has also organized teams of physicians on using stringent protocols that ensured uniform patient care, continued to mentor junior faculty on how to conduct clinical trials, played a key role in testing the USF-patented 3D-printed nasal swab that helped impact the worldwide swab shortage in COVID-19 testing kits, and initiated a COVID biorepository to study relevant biology, pathogenesis, and serology of COVID-19 on residual blood/serum and nasopharyngeal samples and investigate correlations with patient clinical data.

Tracey Taylor
Associate Dean of Graduate Programs

Tracey has embodied USF’s spirit of resilience and courage during the coronavirus crisis by leading the college’s multi-faceted COVID-19 response that has helped local industries, communities, students and faculty.

Tracey developed the college’s COVID-19 Standard Operating Protocol, which includes a daily sign-in survey for symptom recognition and contact tracing. This screening survey is required for any person entering a College of Nursing instructional site on any of its campuses or clinical sites and is an additional layer to the USF-wide Campus Pass COVID-19 Daily Symptom Check.

She led the development of COVID-19 and infection control training modules for the Port of Tampa and its neighboring businesses, helping them create a safer environment. She also worked closely with the Hillsborough County Health Department to embed nurse practitioner students into community settings for them to gain valuable pandemic-related response skills.

Ann Joyce, ’01 and PhD ’16
Associate Director of Advanced Practice Initiatives

Since March, Ann has been the college’s strongest link to numerous community partnerships during the coronavirus pandemic. She has worked tirelessly to ensure that the partnerships have continued to grow while each partner’s pandemic response needs are met.

For example, she helped lead efforts to organize a drive-through donations giveaway in the Sulphur Springs community. The event built on the college’s existing partnership with the Sulphur Springs Neighborhood of Promise and benefited families scarce on food and household cleaning supplies.

Ann coordinated with the Hillsborough County School District to help educate 380 nurses as they prepared to return to the schools and worked with the Port of Tampa as they implemented increased safety protocols. With each collaboration, she has kept the college’s community connections strong.

Mariam Gendi
Pharmacy Manager of USF Health Pharmacy Plus

In the early part of the pandemic, as USF Health quickly transitioned from in-person appointments to telehealth, Mariam took the lead on ensuring USF Health patients continued to receive required prescriptions from Pharmacy Plus, located inside the Morsani Center for Advanced Healthcare. With so few patients being able to pick up their prescriptions on-site, the need was critical to create a process for getting much-needed medications to patients across the Tampa Bay area and beyond. Mariam quickly adjusted Pharmacy Plus schedules and ramped up shipping operations, including innovative cold chain shipping solutions, to ensure continuation in care and therapy for patients, all the while following CDC guidelines for maintaining a safe work area for patients and staff. Mariam was one of many who got out of comfort zones and she worked in the trenches to ensure her patients and providers continued to receive the same standard of care.

H. Joseph Bohn
Assistant Professor and Director, Community Engagement
Deputy Director, DrPH Program

COVID-19 has kept us all on our toes, but perhaps no one more so than the College of Public Health’s Joe Bohn. Shortly after the pandemic hit, he decided to use his love of dance to build camaraderie and connectedness via near-weekly virtual dance classes. “A few of my students asked me to do it,” says Joe, whose virtual classes have focused on line dancing – Tush Push, Good Times and the Cowboy Cha Cha, among others. “I knew none of these dances before April 2020, but fear of isolation was setting in and an innovative action was needed.” He says he averages about eight people (students, faculty and community members) per class. “It takes several hours each week to prepare for the classes, but they help other people,” Joe says. “And they also help make me a stronger teacher, on the dance floor and in the classroom.”

Linsey Grove, MPH ’13 and DPH ’18
USF Health Sciences Instructor

As a public health professional and president of the League of Women Voters of the St. Petersburg Area, Linsey, a College of Public Health alum, knows that civic engagement can have positive effects on individual and population health.

“The ZIP codes with more cases of COVID-19 house the lowest voter turnout precincts in St. Petersburg,” Linsey says. “We know that Black and brown communities suffer from health disparities, making them more vulnerable to COVID-19 morbidity. We wanted to increase civic engagement and keep these communities safe by using mail-in ballots.”

Ahead of the November election, Linsey and her colleagues created a social marketing campaign featuring people in the community filling out mail-in ballots on social media, provided kid ballots to families to promote “keeping the voting tradition alive,” facilitated a texting campaign with culturally informed messages and commissioned a local Black artist to create a mural with a positive vote-by-mail message.

Timi Hager ’05, Associate Director, Digital Learning Services, and team members Heidi Schroeder, Sarah Gentry, Angelika Fairweather and Donna Lycan

With COVID-19 upending face-to-face learning, Timi Hager and the Digital Learning Services team shifted into high gear, working weekends and nights over spring break to create 175 online courses and training dozens of professors one-on-one to use the virtual learning technology. That same level of commitment continued during the fall with trainings of new faculty and additional online course creation as the campus embraced the #OneUSF model while continuing to grapple with the pandemic’s impact. “I couldn’t be more proud of the team,” Timi says. “They’ve come together to meet the course delivery needs of our faculty in a really stressful time.”

Darren Gambrell, ’06 and ’10, Life Member, Assistant
Director, Student Services, and team members Tim Thomas, ’18, Cristyne Ramirez, ’19 and Christopher “Topher” Mowry, ’14

Darren Gambrell and the Student Services team rose to the occasion this past spring when face-to-face learning transitioned to online classes: calling, texting and e-mailing the campus’s 2,100 students to check on their well-being and ensure they were prepared for the changes. Darren’s team continued going the extra mile when in-class learning resumed in the fall. Creating a welcoming campus environment while adhering to health and safety protocols, team members greeted each student, provided hand sanitizer and face coverings and even escorted new students to class. “Students are dealing with a lot right now, and we thought it was important to take a personal approach during these stressful times,” Darren says.

 Course Schedule Team

The conversion of a predominantly classroom-based course schedule to one that offered the flexibility of online and hybrid modalities to accommodate the needs of 50,000 students was a momentous task and was adeptly accomplished by USF’s Course Schedule Team this past summer in a very short period of time.

By late July, the newly formed team, representing Academic Affairs, Information Technology, Innovative Education and Student Success, coordinated fall course offerings by updating systems to reflect reduced classroom capacities; worked with colleges and faculty members to adjust how, where and when sections were delivered to students; updated registration processes; and communicated with students, faculty and staff.

The team continues to work together, recently delivering the spring schedule and now focusing on summer 2021. 

Financial Aid Team

One of the busiest offices at USF is without a doubt Financial Aid. Student support was typically offered through in-person consultations, phone calls and emails, but when USF went remote last March, the team was challenged without the infrastructure of their physical office.

With the help of IT, they implemented a website chatbot to assist students, adopted the Microsoft Teams platform, and then became the first office (other than the IT Help Desk) to move to the Five9 system to receive and make literally tens of thousands of phone calls.

With special COVID-19 funding sources, the crew also had additional aid to administer and counsel students on. To date, Financial Aid has processed more than 6,600 federal CARES Act applications, distributed 22,213 We Got U-SF Scholarships & Waivers, and distributed USF United Support Funds to another 362 students, totaling more than $33 million – and all in addition to the financial aid packages typically offered to 75 percent of our student population.

COMPASS Peer Coaches

The COMPASS Peer Coaches have been assisting first-year, second-year and transfer students through their transition to the USF St. Petersburg campus since early June. At a time when many students are living away from campus and taking classes virtually, the peer coaches’ friendly faces and incredible knowledge of USF are invaluable to student success.

The 24 dedicated student coaches take time to have intentional conversations with their peers to create community and foster a sense of pride in being a Bull. Since the summer, the Peer Coaches met with students more than 600 times, focusing their conversations on friendship, academic success and involvement. Additionally, the Peer Coaches are responsible for group engagement through the Network, a variety of interest groups designed to help Bulls find students with similar interests. Thanks to the support of the Peer Coaches, COMPASS has engaged with 62 percent of first-year students on the St. Petersburg campus.

New Student Connections Peer Advisor Leaders (PALs)

The PALs added “virtual mentor” to their role as the team of 24 student staff provided a proactive, meaningful connection to 9,470 Tampa campus undergraduate students since March 2020. More than 18,345 outreach calls were made to USF first-year, transfer and rising seniors. The PALs answered student questions, referred students to remote learning and support resources, reminded students of their connections with USF, and coached them for continued progress toward a degree.
 
Their work successfully cultivated community and a sense of belonging.

Meredith Mechanik
Student Program Coordinator

When USF announced it would be transitioning to remote learning for the remainder of the semester, Meredith worried about how students could stay connected. So she turned to a time-honored concept: the pen pal. A student program coordinator at the COMPASS Student Experience program at USF’s St. Petersburg campus, Meredith launched the College Pen Pal program on March 17. Less than 48 hours later, more than 700 students from universities across the country had signed up to correspond with a like-minded friend. She and her colleagues have now formed matches among more than 1,600 participants from 100 different universities, including NYU, Yale and the University of Zambia.

“While there is so much uncertainty right now, there has been comfort in knowing that we’re all in this together,” says Meredith. “Regardless of location, major or university, college students around the world are having the shared experience of social distancing. We are so excited to see what kinds of connections and creative endeavors come out of this project.”

David Brodosi
Associate Director, Innovative Education

Online education has always been a top priority on USF’s St. Petersburg campus. But with so many classes transitioning to a remote or blended format due to COVID-19, the need for high-quality online learning suddenly became even more acute. That’s where David stepped in. A member of the Innovative Education team on the St. Petersburg campus, he spent the summer developing training, creating templates and preparing classrooms so that faculty could design their own courses and successfully teach both in-person and online audiences. In addition, David served as a resource to faculty, offering guidance on how best to use the new technology and providing direction on adhering to the standards set out by Quality Matters, a program out of the University of Maryland that uses a set of best practices to evaluate the design of online courses and recognizes those courses that meet the highest standards of learning.

Alexis Naguib says she lost her best friend when her grandfather died in June of mesothelioma at the age of 76. Today the sophomore at USF’s St. Petersburg campus channels her grief into helping senior citizens who may be feeling lonely and isolated as a result of the pandemic. Every week, Alexis calls a woman more than 50 years her senior to chat and listen to stories about the woman’s travels as a scuba diving instructor. It’s part of a new initiative called St. Pete Friends, which matches USF students with seniors in assisted living facilities at a time when many are craving connections as a result of social distancing restrictions. Alexis says she was a little nervous at first but now considers the woman she calls a close friend. “People of her generation can really give you advice and help you grow as a person,” she said.