Today's Update: Friday, June 20, 2025
June 20, 2025
Dear Student Life team,
Happy High Five Friday!
This past weekend saw the annual Special Olympics at Ohio State, and Student Life once again was at the forefront of making it a success. In fact, I received a special High Five message earlier this week from a Student Life team member who participated as an athlete and wanted to share her gratitude for all the work and support that went into making the weekend such a special one. High Fives to those involved, including Dave DeAngelo, Shea Ryan, Eric Schutter, Alex Jimenez, Scott Holmes and Peter Miller, Leah Fetters, Julie Sanzone, Megan BeVier, Morgan Gill, Frida Gillespie, Shana Parker, Rebecca Kapusta, Dani Rodriguez Pacheco, Bea Graves, Kyle Moore, Ayeshia Pompey, Hauwa Imran, Christian Thompson, Annie Schuster, Barb Kefalas, Xavier De Freitas, Alexandria Davis, Taylor Whittington, Shannon Mullally, Katie Duffy, Ethan Oldfield, Ethan Harvill, Matt Wright, Brianna Langs, Natalee Blackford, Beth Wallace, Pasha Sergeev, Stephen Baradon, Kathie Serif, Lori Green, Gabe Simms, Faith Vrancken, Ally Meyer, Sabrina Broner, Roger Garland, Zach Rall, Brian Bassitt, Danielle Bereznay, Steve Hicks, David Grigg, Mike Gassen, Chad Crumwell, Richard Kirk, Leon Hines and Amanda Hicks.
Two Student Life departments, Off-Campus and Commuter Student Engagement (OCCSE) and Counseling and Consultation Service (CCS), recently attended major conferences to reaffirm Ohio State’s international leadership in all things higher education.
A number of the OCCSE team members attended the International Town and Gown Association’s annual City and University Relations Conference at Kent State University, facilitating three sessions. High Fives to Chris Antjas, Lindsey Shaw, Lauren Stazen, Jacob Glorioso, Cece Albon, Rochelle Toth and our OSUPD friends for facilitating engaging and informative sessions showcasing the impressive town and gown work across our community. An extra High Five to Rochelle for nominating this year’s Community Partner award winner, the City of Columbus Code Enforcement team.
Part of the CCS team represented Ohio State at the Association for University and College Counseling Center Outreach (AUCCCO) 18th Annual Conference in San Antonio, Texas. High Fives to Darreon Greer, Christina Szuch, Joni Sivey, Peter Oduwole, Ven Palmieri, Carrington Mahr, Amaya Rakes, Laura Lewis, Hunter Sully and Harry Warner for providing six presentations including two pre-conference sessions.
High Five to Felix Alonso for being part of the faculty for the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) Young Alumni and Student Engagement Conference in Los Angeles. He is overseeing the Student Philanthropy track and facilitating several presentations.
Our colleagues at the Wooster campus want to be sure BuckID’s Tyler Wynkoop gets a High Five. Tyler drove to the Wooster campus late one afternoon to take them a spare part for a broken ID card printer so they could start orientation the next day.
High Five to everyone helping BuckID with their significant access control projects this summer – especially student employees from Student Life Technology Services (from Mark Arthur’s team) and Housing and Residence Education (from Gabi Bockelman’s team) that have been pitching in alongside the BuckID Physical Security Operations team (including Access Control Student Assistants Hillary and Abdullah) to stage materials. It really saves time upgrading 2,300 bedroom locks in the North Residential District by getting all of the pieces and parts unboxed, organized and staged in advance.
Also at BuckID, High Five to Access Control Specialist Paul O’Leary for coordinating with the various stakeholders who work around the NRDT buildings, which are used extensively for camps and conferences. And High Five to Senior Systems Analyst Nathan Bidwell for testing, troubleshooting, debugging and helping to design how things work in our new access control system over the past 18 months.
More BuckID love with a High Five to Sean Stewart and the department’s front office team for welcoming all 8,000+ members of the incoming class visiting the BuckID office. If you’re around, be sure to catch Sean using his radio voice over their new PA system to announce cards when they’re ready. BuckID is truly rolling out the Scarlet carpet for our incoming students.
One of our student government leaders wrote to nominate Technology Services’ Dan Hausman for a High Five, calling his help on a project “truly amazing,” adding, “He worked so quickly and was extremely patient with me when I was utterly confused. He checked in various times without my prompting, which means the world to me. I have never had such wonderful and quick support from a team like his.”
Who says your job can’t be fun?! High Fives to DJ Morgan, Willis Knight Jr. and Jose Chilatra for enjoying themselves while doing their tasks and showing off some excellent dance moves.
Have a Scarlet and Great weekend, and, because it’s important in any order, Og Skcub!!
Melissa S. Shivers, PhD
Senior Vice President for Student Life
The Ohio State University