Appreciating student employees

By Elliot Novess
Western Herald

What is behind the “W”?

Student employees are.

This is the theme surrounding the 24th Annual Western Michigan University Student Employee Appreciation Week starting Feb. 15.

The Gary L. Belleville Student Employee and the Supervisor of the Year Awards are the main event of appreciation week. The Belleville award ceremony takes place Feb. 18 from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. in the West Ballroom of the Bernhard Center.

Supervisors of student employees can go online to the WMU Career Network and nominate a student. Student employees are encouraged to do the same for their supervisors. The nomination form can be found at http://tr.im/LLZE. Nominations are due by Feb. 9.

A panel of three judges looks at all of the nominees. A student and supervisor are chosen as the winners.  However, all of the nominees are recognized at the awards ceremony.

Campus and Community Service Program Coordinator Brenda Case-Parris has worked in Career Services at WMU for 34 years. Two years ago the award ceremony was renamed to recognize her former boss, Gary Belleville.

“He started the event,” said Parris. “A few years ago we changed the name of the event to honor him.”

Belleville worked at WMU from 1967 though 1993.  He founded the Student Employment Referral Service, now known has Career and Student Employment Services.

The winner of the Belleville award is sent to the Midwest Association of Student Employment Administration national competition. A WMU student has never won.

“The [national] winner gets some publicity and a scholarship,” Parris said.

Besides the Belleville awards, the week is dedicated to the hard work of student employees and their supervisors. Departments have in-house awards, luncheons, and gift exchanges to commemorate student and supervisor contributions.

“WMU employs 4,000 students,” Paris said. “Without them we could not do what we do.”

Short URL: http://www.westernherald.com/?p=14294

Posted by HeraldAdmin on Jan 31 2010. Filed under Campus, News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry

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