[Rx2021] New & Noteworthy: Staff Transitions

Tue Aug 11 17:09:41 EDT 2020

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   New & Noteworthy:  Staff Transitions                                                        August 11, 2020
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The transitions of PittPharmacy people continue.  Today, I share that three staff members will be making transitions over the next several weeks.  Each person has had a tremendous impact on PittPharmacy.

Jan Shaw, Director of Communications. Those of you who were with us in 2004 will remember that when Jan joined us, our PittPharmacy magazine was two color (black print on white paper with shading of a second color).  We outsourced photographs.  We did few if any videos and had no in-house production expertise or knowledge of how to develop a story board.  There was no ePittPharmacy News. We had hired an event planner for our first RxTravaganza Gala.  And then came Jan, who started at PittPharmacy as a part of the communications team and developed first one skill and then one by one, additional skills; she took on and “owned” new roles including the managing editor of PittPharmacy magazine.  She became Director of Communications and our Communications Team, which consisted of her and a team of people each of whom had other full-time roles. Today, we have fabulous color publications with a recognizable brand.  Post cards and other mailings are themed and clever.  She created a standard and rhythmicity for ePittPharmacy News. And any of you who have been lucky enough to be the subject of her photographs knows that she works magic—she certainly has for me.
Jan will be retiring on September 30, 2020.  And what a legacy she is leaving. She has been a constant advocate for excellence and creativity in our print and digital communications. Join me in congratulating her.

Nancy Spice, Research Project Manager.  Nancy had quite a sponsored research portfolio before joining PittPharmacy in 2013.  She gained experience starting in 1997 at the Allegheny-Singer Research Institute and then at the University of Pittsburgh where she was assistant director for grants management and the assistant director for training at Pitt’s Office of Research.  Nancy has shared her wisdom and knowledge through presentations at both local and national research administrator conferences.
When she joined us in Fall 2013, we fully appreciated how fortunate we were to recruit someone with the extent of background that she had.  That proved to be true, as Nancy’s expertise in grants administration has been an incredible asset to PittPharmacy.  Nancy is the all-knowing proposal guru, the enforcer of required deadlines, the identifier of new funding opportunities and a sometimes cheerleader encouraging faculty that they can successfully submit proposals. She has done an exquisite job managing the research grants and project office. She increased communications with investigators and has overseen our grant management office as the PittPharmacy portfolio of grant applications and post-award funding doubled in magnitude. Faculty members can attest to the excellence of the support Nancy has provided directly and indirectly for investigators at PittPharmacy.
We celebrate Nancy’s career, thank her for her contributions and wish her luck in her new retirement adventures.

Thomas Waters, Director of New Media. When Tom joined the School of Pharmacy in 1999, he brought with him a brought range of educational backgrounds, skills and experiences, including a decade of work for the Department of Neurobiology.  We have unknowingly seen some of that background (degree in education) in the creative work he has produced.
As an innovator, one of the first projects Tom tackled was the need to repeatedly ask faculty for the “same information” and to find a way to “publish” the same information in various ways. Thanks to Tom, PittPharmacy was among the first units—if not the first—on campus to have a database feed information to our Web site. Over the years, he has built numerous databases. Faculty are well aware of the software he customized for the Annual Achievement Report.  What you may not know is that Tom built the system so that the data collected also feeds the School’s Annual Report for publications, faculty awards and various tables.
His latest addition to course support is Syllabus Builder. I saw the incredible power of the platform for the first time this term both as a course coordinator and “consumer” of the summaries that Tom can produce using the software. In an “instant,” he can show the locations of every course we offer and whether it is being offered in person or remotely.
Tom also created our Web site, managed design, instituted the use of tools to track page views to drive changes that will increase placement in search-engine results, and more. Tom made PittPharmacy the first Pitt unit to achieve greater than 90 percent accessibility for our Web pages and more. Tom was a member of our awarding-winning team that received the 2018 AACP Rufus A. Lyman Award for the best paper published in the American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education.

As an artist and an activist, Tom models civic engagement and advocacy for positive change. We will miss Tom’s creativity and hard work, his ability to listen and respond, and how he challenged us to think better and differently. We wish him all the best.

To Jan, Nancy, and Tom
Thank you—each of you—for your commitment, diligence, passion and creativity.  Your daily work has made PittPharmacy live up to its mission of excellence, innovation, and leadership in everything we do.  We will sorely miss each of you.

And now, I ask everyone to join me in a big round of congratulations and well wishes to Jan, Nancy, and Tom as they start the next phase of their life.

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Patricia D Kroboth, Dean
Dr. Gordon J. Vanscoy Distinguished Service Professor
School of Pharmacy
University of Pittsburgh

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