[ONEREPUBLIC, "I LIVED"] Hoping you take that jump, you don't feel the fall. Hoping the water rises. You built a wall. Hoping the crowd screams out, screaming your name. Hope if everybody runs, you choose to stay. 

Hope that you fall in love, and it hurts so bad, babe. The only way you can know, give it all you have. 

And I hope that you don't suffer but take the pain. Hoping the moment comes, you'll say I did it all I I did it all 

I own every second that this world could give. So many places-- the thing that I did. With every broken bone, I swear I lived. Hope that you spend your days, but they all add up. 

But when that sun goes down, hope you raise your cup I wish that I could witness all your joy and all your pain but until my moment comes, I'll say I I did it all. I I did it all I own every second that this world could give. 

I saw so many places, the things that I did with every broken bone, I swear I lived. With every broken bone, I swear I lived. With every broken bone, I swear I lived. I I did it all. I I did it all I own every second that this world could give. 

I saw so many places, the things that I did. With every broken bone, I swear I lived. I swear I lived 

Good morning, everyone. My name is John Dunlap. I'm the chief HR officer for the UMass system office. On behalf of everybody who works to make this morning happen, I wanted to thank you all for being here. 

It's nice when you put on event-- an event. It's nicer when you put on an event, and people come to the event. And so it was a pleasure to see such a large turnout, particularly when we have a good chunk of people who are only working a couple of days a week on site to see this number of people show up for their colleagues was a real pleasure. So thank you for being here. 

I'm looking behind me, and I'm seeing this video clip in the corner of the screen. And I just noticed I don't care for it because it shows my bald spot, which is otherwise hard to see. I have the opportunity of starting this morning's programming by introducing University president Marty Meehan for some welcoming comments. 

Thank you very much, John, and I'm delighted to be here, delighted to see all of you here. I can't remember the last time it was this many people in this room. This has been a really, really difficult three years. And it's great to see so many people here. 

And I want to kick off by just thanking each and every one of you. These types of events are an opportunity to kind of reflect on what each department, each sector of the president's office, what we do, and how we're improving, and how our employees are collaborating and working with the campuses. So I just want to open up by saying thank you. Thank you for all that you do. The university is getting stronger. 

In spite of the fact that these are difficult times in terms of COVID, we face enormous challenges over the next 5 to seven years in enrollment. And the reason why is because, demographically, in New England, and in fact, the northeastern part of the country, the number of high school graduates has been slightly coming down, but it's going to come down at a much quicker pace. The way our finances are set up as a university, we get a lump sum of money. But we don't get-- we get that money. But most of the money comes from tuition and fees that students pay. 

So the challenge in all of higher education, it's not just UMass. The challenge for a lot of the small privates, particularly the small non-elite privates that they have their discounting at a high rate. We've seen many of them have closed. Remember, Mount Ida closed, and UMass Amherst took advantage of that more as a real estate deal, but also took a number of the programs. 

So there's going to be a lot of challenges. So one of the ways you meet the challenge of that is becoming more effective as an organization and more efficient as an organization and find ways, whether it's through United Procurement Services, how you buy your energy, everything that we do is critically important to our-- making sure this university is healthy over the long haul, and by that I mean in 25 years and 50 years and 100 years. And the work that each and every one of you do is critically important in that. 

And by any way, we all-- oftentimes, we look and measure UMass system with other systems around the country. We look at best practices. We try to see what the best systems are doing. 

And we are in that category of one of the best systems, and it's because of the work that all of you have done, particularly over the last 10 years. In companies today and in organizations today-- and it doesn't matter what sector it is, whether it's finance or whether it's higher education or teaching, it's really difficult today to get people to stay in a job for a long period of time. 

People are moving around in jobs today at an unprecedented rate. It's been a trend really over the last 25 years, but in particular right now, it's difficult to keep employees. And I talk to CEOs from various companies on a regular basis, and everyone's having difficulty keeping folks. 

So one of the reasons we're delighted to do this event is we want to shed light on those people who have been here for 25 years and longer and thank you for your service and encourage folks to stay at the university. And that's become a major challenge. 

Even if you look on our campuses, all of our campuses have open positions which they're having difficulty filling. So an event like this is an opportunity not just to say thank you, but to think about what we can do as an organization to make sure we keep people happy in the organization, to make sure they're fulfilled in the job, but also to provide incentives to keep people here. 

And it's interesting because, today, fewer and fewer companies have, for example, a defined pension benefit. And it's almost become cool for nobody to have a defined pension benefit anymore. And I don't think that's really good for society. I think to the extent that we can incentivize people to be able to get a defined pension benefit in the long run is much better for society. It actually works out for us for those of you who decide to be part of the-- and not all employees do depending upon how long they plan to stay in an organization. 

I think I'm proud of the fact that we have a good, strong, competitive defined pension benefit that in the long run, I think is better for society. As people retire, as they get older, I just think it's a better system for society. I want to congratulate all of folks that have been here longer than 25 years. 

I want to acknowledge I think the only new person that we have coming into 25 is John Hoey. And ironically enough, John works for me in the president's office. He was a press person for-- in journalism for a number of years. 

He really got a pretty impressive record working for states news service, the Brockton Enterprise. He was the president of the Statehouse Press Association. What I mean to say, he was on the other side for a lot of years. 

And then Bill Bulger was the president. And Bill Bulger, who didn't have a reputation for liking the press very much, but he recruited John and John came to the president's office. He then, I think in 2007, left and went to UMass Dartmouth, where he led the communications and public affairs for Dartmouth for a number of years. And then I asked him to come back in 2019 to the president's office to take up the key role of the communications director. 

And I'm going to embarrass him by introducing-- many of you probably don't know John. But John, could you wave and say hello? John promised me dinner if I did that. So I did that. 

So again, I just want to say thank you to-- for everything that you do. But I feel good about where the university is headed. And to the extent that I can ever do anything to make the environment better, talk to the folks that you work with you. Get it up the chain, and I'll do anything I can to make the environment for each and every one of you better. 

I have enormous respect for what you do and even greater sensitivity to what you all have been through, what all of our families have been through over the last three years. It's been most difficult, most challenging. And it's just great to see everyone here and to see everyone together. So thank you for what you do for UMass. 

Thank you so much, Marty. Some rules of engagement before we begin with the awards. The presenters will come up here. They will announce the names of the recipients. 

The recipients will walk over to this table to get your certificate and then come over here, being mindful of the taped down cord, standing in front of this wall right here for a photo with President Meehan and then can return to your seats. With that, I would like to invite Yara Hentz from UITS, who is our first presenter. 

Hello, and good morning. My name is Yara Hentz, and I am a program manager at the UITS Project Management Office. I was here for a whole six months and thought I had it figured out right. 

I asked my former manager, Carol Walsh, for a more challenging project that was deep in technology. Carol truly delivered me a challenging and then some by assigning me the Apps and Security Solutions Project. My goal was to install-- our goal, I'm sorry-- was to install apps and security solutions into PeopleSoft for the HR finance and student administration applications. This would impact the president's office and all five campuses. 

Our purpose was clear-- to migrate a security system across all six of these campuses that would protect, secure, and identify any exposure of sensitive data across these applications and endpoints. This initiative involved a very large group of individuals from all areas of human resources, finance, student administration, operations, development, IT, communications, general counsel, and accessibility. 

To add to the challenge, a major critical requirement included no disruption in any way to the daily operations of classes, admissions, students, faculty, staff, and the school calendar year of events. Our timeline was to get this completed in 18 months. We thought, OK, we got this. We can do this. 

Then, at one terrifying Zoom meeting, our CIO, Michael Milligan, came along with some updated business requirements and the need to accelerate the timeline to just three months to get it completed before the false start of classes. We thought, oh my goodness. How are we ever going to do this? 

I will say Michael gave us a great pep talk. He said he believed in us and knew we have the talent, teamwork, and determination to make this happen. 

As I stared there at my Zoom screen in pure horror, I thought to myself, [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH]. I have no idea how I'm going to do this. But as it turned out, Michael was right. 

The team was amazing. They showed up and delivered at every single challenge. There was no. 

There was never a no but always a yes, let's figure it out together, and let's get it done attitude. This is and continues to be a level of want to succeed that makes this team so successful and rewarding to work with. 

This team's precision in migrating the security solution was nothing less than miraculous. Their commitment to the project, to the university, the staff, the students, and the faculty was unwavering. The end of my story is that classes began in the fall of 2022 seamlessly and with no interruptions. Today, due to this project team's creativity, hard work, intelligence, and collaboration, we have a more robust security logging system, enabling us to migrate PeopleSoft applications to our new Identity Cloud single sign on architecture. 

In addition, we now have the flexibility to generate more granular data driven centralized reporting, strengthening our commitment to service delivery, excellence, value, and trust. I am incredibly proud to be working and learning amongst this group of talented individuals and super humbled to have been a member of this team. Thank you. 

And the rock stars are Jim Barbieri; Kristina Bissonette; Mounika Bonam; Frank Butler; Sue "it better be on the RAID log" Cerrato; Dee "I got your back" Cogliandro; Pete "do I really have to be on this Zoom" Connell; our CTO and visionary Rick Cote; Maria "I will call you back at 9:00 PM tonight" Dahod; legendary Carol Dugard; Damian "not at 3:00 PM because I'm picking up the kids" Esposito; Marius "I work in finance" Farcas; Joe Fontecchio; Rebecca Forest; Connie "it better be on the Connie test list" Gilroy; John Kelly; Karen LeBlanc; Jules Lipke; Kristen Luiz; Susan McHugh; Megan "I better see it before it goes out" Momtaheni; Brian Moss; Jim "why am I always the first one on the Zoom" Muchata; James Pearson; Maria "Rick, that's not going to work" Ravanis; Kathy "oh yeah" Sawyer; Kanhai Shah; and Euclides "Yara, you got this" Velazco. 

[SIDE CONVERSATION] 

If the other half of the room could remain seated. While folks are returning to their seat, we do have some announcements that we're going to intermingle with the presentations. I'd like to just talk about some upcoming events of the DEIA team, and these events are coordinated and put on by your coworkers. International Holocaust Remembrance Today is Friday, January 27. We will have a lunchtime program on that. 

International Women's Day for Wednesday, March 8 is under development, and we will also do a tell your story on St Patrick's Day. I'll be sharing some of my Irish heritage, and I welcome other employees who are interested to be in touch with me to share some of their Irish heritage. And it being Irish, you can feel free to make up what you don't know. So let me know if you're interested. The next presentation is our first individual award, and the presenter is our CEO, Michael Milligan. 

Good morning. Responsible, accountable, empathetic, trustworthy, kind, and now added, legendary. These are the words that come to mind when I think about this individual. 

This person combines a special sense of urgency with a high quality of work. When I know this person is on the job, I know I need not follow up. I know I need not worry about it. And I know the job will get done. 

Personally, that gives time back to me to get a lot of other things completed. It's not that this person did something well one time. It's that this person does everything well all of the time. She does it with a smile, and she does it with care. When it's a job posting, onboarding or offboarding an employee, helping recruit a new employee, making sure our paychecks are right, this person is on the spot and always there for an email back or call back. 

I am privileged and pleased this person is part of the OMPO. And thank you for the support she provides UITS and me. Carol Dugard, thank you. 

Having myself had the privilege to work for Carol, I second all of Mike's comments. Our next presenter for a group award is Christine Packard. 

Good Morning, everyone. I'm pleased this morning to honor an incredible group of individuals who represented the president's office on the system-wide business and travel expense working group. This group was responsible for working with our campuses to update the Board of Trustees policy on business and travel expenses, develop administrative standards to guide the implementation of the policy, and develop a communication strategy to roll out across the university to inform our system-wide community of the changes that impact them. As you may imagine, this was a significant undertaking, essentially streamlining six unique processes and sets of rules something new to all of us, I'm sure, into a standardized approach with system-wide applicability on a topic that touches nearly every UMass employee. 

But this extraordinary achievement in and of itself worth commendation is not really why I nominated this group. I nominated this amazing group of professionals because of their dedication and commitment to the nearly two-year process to bring this project to fruition. The consensus that was built around really sticky issues was a direct result of the collaboration and trust our colleagues built with our campus partners. This involves significant communication and listening skills by every member of the group. The members of this working group masterfully facilitated resolution through engaged but respectful dialogue, encouraging opening-- open exchanges of varying perspectives, and fostering a sense of partnership and collaboration, again building trust to enable getting really hard work done. The result is a comprehensive policy that better supports the university and our employees, a uniform set of administrative standards with system-wide applicability, and appropriate flexibility for campus implementation, and most importantly, a great foundation to build upon as we work on additional complex projects, including Project Fastlane. 

Please join me in recognizing our presidents office colleagues, John Chayrigues from OGC, Alyssa Cherubino from OGC, David Cho from UPST, Claudia Cortes from UPST, Michael Durkin from UPST, Brian Girard from UPST, Kelly Gregory from the controller's office, Patrick Hitchcock from the controller's office, Ashley Hunter UPST, Rob Hyde UPST, David Nero innovation and operational services, Amanda Onwuka UPST, and Jacob Sturtz innovation and operational services. 

While the group is getting their photo taken, I'm going to walk over here to Amy Thompson, who's going to give us a quick shout-out about Operation De-clutter, which is taking place today. 

Hi, everyone. I just want to remind the Shrewsbury folks that today is one of our Shed and Shred days. So we're ready for you guys to go upstairs, start decluttering your individual workspaces, shared workspaces. We've got all the resources you need. 

If you have any questions, please see me or Lucas. We're here to help, and the next Shed and Shed day is two weeks from tomorrow on January 25. And then we have a couple more after that. So let us know if you need anything. Thanks. 

All right, our next award is an individual award. And I'd like to invite our Assistant Vice President University Controller Patrick-- Patrick Hitchcock. 

Thank you and good morning. When I was hired about a year ago, I was promised that I had a strong associate controller in place when I was going to join. Not only was that true, but she has continued to impress me in every way as we've gone through this. Kelly, it's been a very tumultuous year here in the controller's team, with turnover throughout the entire department at all levels of it, including myself, obviously. And she continued to be the rock in the foundation of that team that keeps us grounded and focused and moving forward in a positive direction. 

In addition to the turnover, there's also been some of the most complex accounting transactions that this organization has seen in a very long time. And she's been at the forefront of implementing all of these. First of all, we acquired a new entity in UMass Global. It was the first new college brought into the system in over 30 years and the first significant component unit that we've had to consolidate in over 60 years. 

Kelly was responsible for determining how to incorporate that information, presenting it to the board, the financials, and ultimately ensuring that it was accurately represented. This was no small feat. There was a lot of back and forth, a lot of negotiation in what was going to be needed, and she stayed calm and focused throughout that. 

In addition, as many of you probably heard us talk about, Gatsby 87. Her team implemented one of the most complex and impactful accounting system-- or accounting changes that we have seen in probably a decade within the system, and that was applied across the campuses with minimal to no complaints. And we were able to actively and proactively respond to all issues that we saw within that. 

One additional thing she's done is she's actually completed two audits in six months of the Uniform Guidance audits. This is related to the COVID-19 CARES Act funding. This is new funding that we have never seen before. No one knows how to account for. And she was one of the forefront people in communicating with the campuses and ensuring that the funds were used ineligible ways, communicated to the auditors, and as I said, got through two audits in six months with external auditors with clean opinions. That is no small feat. 

Finally, one of the things that she's also done is helped increase our correspondence and coordination across the president's office departments. She works closely with the treasurer's office on a regular basis, as well as the Budget Office. And we've significantly increased our reporting to both Lisa, as well as the various campuses on our cash and investments, which has been a sore point for many years among the various campuses. 

Finally, on a day-to-day basis, she's continued to strengthen and our standing with the various campuses and their controller's teams. She's respected and consulted on a regular basis for both unique and day-to-day accounting items, regardless of who or where they're coming from. She's constantly looking for ways to improve how we touch points with the campuses. She's improved our weekly and monthly reporting sessions and is always looking for ways to strengthen those and find more value in them on a regular basis. 

These actions all strongly reflect the accountability framework that we're building around by increasing our internal controls, transparency, and accountability, and financial accountability. I'm proud of the work she's done in the past year and look forward to continuing to move forward with this great work on a regular basis. Congratulations, Kelly. 

Congratulations to you, Kelly. Our next presenter is our Chief Information Officer and Vice President, Michael Milligan. 

Thank you again. Pardon me. The University of Massachusetts strives to have every student feel welcomed and valued as an equal member of each of its campuses. Enabling inclusive identity is a significant step in a student's experience by allowing them to identify their chosen name, sex, personal pronoun, gender identity, and sexual orientation. 

Two years ago, I was approached by the Dartmouth campus asking if we could help with a serious issue at their campus. Their student rosters were not properly updated with chosen name, disconnecting many of their students from their classes and their communities. With the combination of UITS, OGC, and HR, a UMPO team was quickly put together and asked to address the issue. 

Knowing we had to manipulate a very hard-to-manipulate student system, it was going to be hard work moving forward. Thankfully, we were able to partner with all of the great work that had already been established at the Amherst campus. Dedicated teams and dedicated meeting times were established early on to set the vision and objectives, and the campuses were there along the way to help set that mission, vision, and those objectives. I am pleased and proud to note this was a system-wide partnership. 

Over the last year, some outstanding change and enhancement has occurred at the campuses and within our system. Students can now update their chosen name. We have relabeled our PeopleSoft student information system field names and in line with those accepted by LGBTQ+ communities, allowed for value of x to be chosen for sex, much like our RMV allows today. 

We have also allowed students to indicate their desired pronouns, gender identity, and sexual orientation through self-- I'm sorry-- through student self-service. The feedback from the campuses to this point has been phenomenal. And the input and the volume of students that have been using the system has been unreal to see. It was a real need. And we are meeting our students where we need to meet them so that they are part of our communities and ensuring that they are staying on our campuses. 

I'd like to recognize the following team members who made this endeavor a success-- Jeanie Beaulieu, Patrick Brandon, Karen LeBlanc, Jules Lipke, Shahriar Panahi, Kanhai Shah, Brad Smith, Kate Targett, Pam Theodore, and our project manager and leader Joe Zawlich. My thanks to all. And I also want to send a special thanks out to Boston Dartmouth and Lowell for their accountability in ensuring that they had all their team members at every one of these meetings. My thank you to everyone. 

Thank you all. Congratulations to all of you. We're having to redo. Someone blinked. The next is an individual award, and our presenter is assistant treasurer Shaun Curry. 

I'll try to keep this short because I think the last thing this person would want is for me to speak for the full five minutes on her behalf. Hi, everyone. My name is Shawn Curry, and I'm the assistant treasurer of operations at the Treasury Group here. It is my honor to speak in front of you all today as we recognize Molly Lynch for this individual award. Fiscal year '22 was unique for the Treasury Group as it brought in change to personnel and processes. 

Before I started in December of '21, Molly took it upon herself to learn as much as she could from my predecessor. This extra time and work she put in allowed the Treasury Department to continue business as usual as new members learn processes and got acclimated. Not only did Molly take on additional tasks, but she improved upon them to make things more digestible and efficient. This kind of effort is what truly makes a team a team. 

Molly was also essential in Treasury's effort to reevaluate and implement our new investment strategy for operating cash. Whether it was organizing a meeting with the many investment managers we were talking to or putting together an ad hoc analysis for myself or Andrew, she was always willing and able to take on the challenge and present it accurately and efficiently. Molly is part of the glue that holds the Treasury Department together, and she deserves recognition for that. 

Whenever there's an issue, project, or a task that needs to be backfilled, Molly is willing and able to take that on for the team. She is a tremendous asset, and we're all very thankful to call her a colleague, but also a friend. So please join me in congratulating her on this much deserved award. 

I'm just going to say something so that it's not awkward while she tries to walk all the way around. Congratulations, Molly. 

And the next award is a group award for the Project MET Core Team. And at this point, I would like to introduce Michael Durkin from UPST. 

Thank you. Good morning. From simple, small dollar contracts to large, complex agreements, effective and efficient contracting of the procurement of goods and services is critical for the University of Massachusetts to deliver on its promise of teaching, research, and service to the residents of the Commonwealth. We enter into contractual agreements for all types of goods and services, everything from, say, the price of a pen to maybe the lease of a placticized human shoulder. We talked in the team this morning about what was the strangest thing we've contracted. 

We've contracted for Spandex onesies for sheep at our Amherst campus, the repair of fishing nets in Dartmouth. You name it. It flows through a contract and through the university. With contracts and the contracting process at the center of much of what we do in the president's office to provide services to our campuses, it's vital that we have an efficient, compliant contracting process that balances speed and flexibility while also reduces risk. 

When the university unified procurement across the system, we quickly learned that the then in-place contracting process did not meet that same standard that we were driving for. Therefore, the Project MET team was established to address this. We didn't need a change in our contracting process. We needed a metamorphosis of our contracting process. 

The project involved redesigning the contract request, review, and approval process, and we needed a team of individuals to not only re-implement the contract management software, but also to redesign the business process around contracting. This was only accomplished by bringing together an amazing team of talented individuals from across the president's office. Each brought their own knowledge and expertise to the table. And this transformational work was only enabled because this team was not going to stand and say we can't do it because we've never done it that way. They were engaged in building a new contract process from the ground up. 

It's my pleasure this morning to recognize the Project MET core team, who consists of Elisha Alt from UPST, John Chayrigues from OGC, Sue Cone from UPST, Claudia Cortes UPST, the legendary Carol Dugard from HR, Pam Giordano from UPST, Ashley Hunter UPST, Allie Lepper from OGC, Jason MacFadyen from innovation, LeeAnn Pasquini from budget and planning, Mike Rizk from innovation, Shawn Skelly UITS, Brad Smith UITS, and Josh Tucker from treasury. 

Congratulations to all of you. Our next award is an individual award, and our presenter is LeeAnn Pasquini, assistant vice president for budget and planning. 

Good morning, everyone. I'm pleased to honor Joe Skrzek for his invaluable contributions to the president's office, including his leadership within the budget team and his efforts toward making the university's financial information accurate and transparent. Joe is an incredible resource who leads and assists in developing the annual budget, the financial forecast, and the capital plan. He's a member of the A&F Senior Management Team, a structure created to support the development of current leaders within our division, and has clearly been recognized for embracing his role in this group. 

Joe has been an integral part of every capital plan and borrowing that the university has completed over the last 13 years. This role encompasses developing the biennial plan, quarterly reporting, debt issuance requirements, like rating agency presentations, private business use, DCAM projects, state capital requests, and overall coordination and communication to the campuses. He is on a first-name basis with every A&F vice chancellor, budget director, facilities director, and even with rating agency analysts. Almost every aspect of Joe's work is used to present information to President Meehan, our board of trustees, and published on our website. 

There were at least two areas that stood out this past year that were a direct result of his efforts. First was the capital plan. Every two years, the university completes a refresh of our five-year capital plan. Joe redesigned to improve its presentation of data with clearer, more concise dashboards, the addition of more detailed real-time deferred maintenance information, and carried this refresh into our quarterly reporting and capital-- capital to the board. In addition, our scorecard-- Joe created a fiscal health scorecard for the university to help translate how our rating agency score builds up from our various financial metrics. 

And since I've been here, I can say that this scorecard has been the clearest visual of translating how rating-- rating agencies assess us, both qualitatively and quantitatively. The results of these efforts is transparency to all university stakeholders, a foundation for targeted efforts to improve investments, like in deferred maintenance and improve financial ratios, and a precedent for pushing through complex information and projects to a result that provides clear and easy-to-digest information to decision makers. 

If you know Joe, you will know that all of this talk about him is making him so uncomfortable. But I would be remiss if I didn't say just a few more things. Joe is a hard worker and deeply cares about his work. He is trustworthy and fosters relationships with colleagues. He is detail oriented and analytical and does what it takes to get the job done. 

He guides others within the team and represents the president's office in a positive way during interactions with our colleagues here and on our campuses. I truly value his work, and we are fortunate to have him as a member of our team. Please join me in recognizing Joe Skrzek. 

All right, we're going to take an opportunity while we have Ann and Joe standing up here to make an announcement. For that I turn to, Lisa Khaleesi. 

Wow, I haven't been at this vantage point to see all of you. So I wanted to take a moment this morning and share with all of you something unbelievable about this dynamic duo over here who are very far away. You guys should come this way. So I think you all received an announcement that Matt Markowitz, the former associate vice president of administration and finance, left the university to now be the secretary of administration and finance for the Commonwealth. And I'm happy to share with you that this team standing here have accepted new roles effective today. 

Leanne is now being promoted to be the associate vice president of administration and finance, replacing Matt. And Joe Skrzek, who was just recognized for all the tremendous work he does, is now replacing Leanne as the director of Budget and Planning for the university. 

So I'm going to say a few words in a minute, but I just wanted to share all that news with you. We'll send an announcement, an official announcement, out today. But I thought since you're all assembled here, and this is such a warm feeling in this room that it meant-- it made sense to share that with you. So thank you. Thank you, guys. 

And our next award is an individual award, and the presenters-- co presenters are LeeAnn Pasqualini, who spent a good amount of time up here, and David Nero. I'll turn it over to you. 

Thank you. What did you do with my-- ooh, found it. Oh, no, I didn't find it. Here it is. 

So again, this is jointly being presented on behalf of David and myself. We are pleased to honor Holly Wang for her leadership on the implementation of the university's budget tool, known as UN Plan. Back in 2018, the university, in partnership with all campuses, embarked on a process to procure and implement a budget application, the first ever for the university. 

Back then, we utilized expertise within the president's office and the campuses to decide on a vendor and a tool. But it became clear pretty quickly that the tool itself needed a leader to stay current on the functionality, help with the technical questions from the campuses, manage the vendor, help with the relationships between the tool, and PeopleSoft. It needed someone with unique expertise of both IT and administration and finance. 

Holly was identified as this unicorn. She has been the driving force to successfully implementing UM plan. She has embraced what at times felt almost impossible, developing a core team with representation from each campus, helping each campus to launch their budget process, create reports, troubleshoot problems, and work with the vendor on solutions. Without her leadership, the tool would not be in the stage of maturity it is today, but it does not stop there. She also coordinates an annual process to enhance the product and fix issues that arose during the prior year. 

Now, not to get too nerdy here, but the ability to have a single tool that each campus can use yet can be consolidated at the university level really is a best practice in our industry. It allows for more analysis of the data rather than the pushing and pulling of complex spreadsheets. 

The FY23 budget development was the first year that all five campuses utilize the tool, which would not have been accomplished without her leadership. And to top it off, her review of the contract with our vendor resulted in a credit of $25,000 to the university that is being used for further system enhancements. 

Holly has a long history in various roles within the university, both on the IT and A&F sides of the house. Her knowledge of PeopleSoft and our chart of accounts, I would argue, is second to none within the university. She moves work forward, pushing the campuses and sometimes even pushing me to get through the muck to advance the work. 

I am grateful that the innovation team has allowed her to essentially be an extended member of our budget team. It demonstrates a true partnership between our departments that has resulted in real success. Please join me in recognizing Holly Wang. 

All right, while Holly gets her award, there's been some confusion. People thought they had to be an award recipient to get a yogurt parfait. That's not true. The yogurt parfaits are available to everyone. 

Now, President Meehan was nice enough to share some words about John Hoey, but we're not going to give John the opportunity to miss being called to the front of the room to get his certificate. So I'm going to invite Marty back up for the presentation of the 25-plus club. 

Thank you. Let me just say that how inspired I am to be here this morning and how good I feel about the work that each and every one of you have-- that you do every day. There wasn't either a group award or recognition or an individual award or recognition that hasn't been discussed at length at senior staff that isn't integral to what we talk about with our board of trustees, what we talk about at senior staff. Every single award or recognition is at the core of what we do as a university. 

And I have to tell you, sitting here, I am so inspired by this. And it's one of the reasons why we are the best-run public university in New England by far. So I want to say thank you for that. What we've done in terms of inclusion-- I'll tell you a quick funny story. 

I got married this summer. And so I have two boys, and now I have two girls. And about a year and a half ago, my two girls noticed me on a Zoom. And the oldest, she happens to be gay. 

And she said to me, Marty, you're the president of a university. Where are your pronouns? You can't be serious. You've got to get those pronouns. 

And sure enough, as part of this whole effort, I now have my pronouns. And so what I'm trying to convey to you is there is nothing that happened this morning here that isn't integral to what my job is every day in and out, Lisa, our total senior staff. And one of the challenges of running a system is you need to have the credibility of the five campuses that, for so long, have operated independently. 

And we've made so much headway over the last eight or nine years. And it's because of the work that each and every one of you do. So I just want to acknowledge that there is nothing that went on this morning that isn't like right at the core of what we do as a system office. So I'm very inspired. 

And events like this are really important for me to be part of too because every single award, I know exactly the details of everything that went through. I know exactly what the response was from the campuses and back and forth and back and forth. So this is very, very meaningful. 

And I thank you. I thank you for this. I am very, very inspired. 

You'll also probably notice that I screwed up. I wasn't supposed to say what I said about John Hoey. When I said it, I was supposed to say it now, and I'm not going to repeat it other than to say John has been a great asset to the university in different roles. And a lot of times, as with a lot of you, we hire people that have unique experiences in another organization, which enhances the university. And you see in the hiring we go out and try to get at every level people with certain talents that we could add to our university. 

And as I said earlier, John established himself as a great journalist for many years in different roles as a leader among journalists. And if you're going to have somebody come in and be in charge of communications and public affairs and in marketing, it really is good to have that experience of working on, as we say, the other side. Please welcome and congratulate John Hoey for 25 years of service for the University of Massachusetts. 

Congratulations to you, John, and thank you, Marty. I also just want to acknowledge the people who are already members of the 25-plus club-- Bill Smith, who I think is here; Gayle Johnson; Kathy O'Neil, I think I saw here; Diane Tkachuk; Julie Kenny is here; JoAnn Conley; Olmedo Gomez; Zunilka Barrett; Wanda Alston; Sue: Kelly; and Brian Burke. 

One more piece of business before I invite Lisa Calise back up to give closing comments. I would like to ask the following people to stand and step into a place where people can see you because I know you're not going to want to do that. Amy Thompson, Jackie Kettler, Harold Dugard, [INAUDIBLE] Temple, Cheryl Milette who's out today, Jillian Warren, Hollen Murphy who's not with us right now, John Dawson, Marie Canty, Kelley Fucci, Lucas Carter. 

I think that this group of people could put on a presidential inauguration in this forlorn cafeteria. They step up, and they just do an absolutely tremendous job, everything from putting together the videos, the agenda, coordinating with everybody, making sure that everything works. It's extremely important what they do. They do it with such goodwill, such a professional job. Thank you all so much for all the work you did to make today possible. 

Now for closing comments, I would like to introduce Senior Vice President and Treasurer Lisa Calise. 

I just want to start by having you guys give each other round of applause. I mean, what a team. What a great way to start the morning. And as you can imagine, I was not an English major in college. That was not my background. 

But as I sat here this morning and I listened to the remarks, there's consistency in what I heard, which I just want to bring to your attention, the skills that are in this room. We talked about skills, focus, commitment, dedication, trust, very important, a can-do attitude, and last but not least, smiles. And there's something else I heard, which I know many of you. So I know that this is true. 

Most of you do your work, and you don't expect, nor do you want any attention for what you contribute and you do. And it makes you so special, and it makes you so good at what you do. And it allows you to work as a team and get the work done. So give yourselves a group hug. You deserve it. 

I, and as the president already mentioned, I would be nowhere without the work that each one of you contributes in a team effort. We had some individual awards, but lots of this is teamwork. And I guess the other thing I would say in the president mentioned, we are a university system that is the envy of our colleagues around the country. 

And it's no surprise with what you guys are doing. And when I think about the projects we heard about today, you did not take them on because they're easy. There wasn't anything that anyone talked about where you're like, yeah, slam dunk, low-hanging fruit. 

You did them because they're the right thing to do for the university, and they're also hard. And you worked together, and you persevered. So for that, I say thank you and keep doing what you're doing. We have so much to do. So we need to celebrate what we've done, but it just shows me how much we can do together. 

So thank you all, sincerely, from the bottom of my heart. I am more than inspired. It is a tremendous pleasure for me to have the role that I have and to be able to see the fruits of all the labor that you guys put in day in and day out. So thank you. 

Well, thank you all for being here. Have a great day. There's more food left if anybody's hungry. Jackie. Oh, I'm sorry. We have a closing-- like I was saying, we have a closing video. 

[VIDEO PLAYBACK] 

[JACK JOHNSON, "UPSIDE DOWN"] 

Who's to say what's impossible? They forgot this world keeps spinning. Each new day, I can feel a change in everything. 

And as the surface breaks, reflections fade, but in some ways, they remain the same. And as my mind begins to spread its wings, there's no stopping curiosity. I want to turn the whole thing upside down. I'll find the things I say just can't be fair. 

I'll share this love I find with everyone. We'll sing and dance to mother nature's song. I don't want this feeling to go away. Who's to say I can't do everything? Well, I can try. 

And as I roll along, I begin to find things aren't always just what they say. I want to turn the whole thing upside down. I'll find the things they say just can't be found. I'll share this love I find with everyone. 

We'll sing and dance to mother nature's sing. This will keep spinning, and there's no time to wait. Well, it all keeps spinning, spinning, round and round and upside down. Who's to say what's impossible and can't be found? I don't want this feeling to go away. 

Please don't go away. Please don't go away. Please don't go away. Is this how it's supposed to be? Is this how it's supposed to be? 

[END PLAYBACK]