On Friday, October 20th, members of the School of Chemical Sciences (SCS) community gathered to honor and appreciate the outstanding commitment of the Academic Professional and Civil Service staff. The celebratory luncheon was held at the Illini Union.

This year, SCS recognized individuals who have dedicated five, ten, fifteen, and twenty years of service to our campus community. SCS extends gratitude to all the awardees for their invaluable contributions and for being foundational to the department's success. SCS is proud to reflect on another year of outstanding service and dedication from its staff.

Five Years

Kihyun Cho
David Culler
Nikki Duay
David Jones
Katriena Knights
Xiuli Mao

Ten Years

Gayle Adkisson
Leslie Chenoweth
Lori Johnson

Fifteen Years

Feng Dong
Don Marrow
Patricia Simpson

Twenty Years

Michelle Davis
Nan Holda
Haijun Yao

The School of Chemical Sciences gives a special thanks to those who have completed over twenty years of service to campus...

Michelle Davis is an incredible asset to SCS in many ways. She manages a procurement office that is one of the highest volume on campus, which includes supervising 2 staff members. She is a dedicated staff member that works tirelessly to ensure the quantity and quality of her work is top-notch. There is no doubt that the business office is better and more efficient with Michelle in place.

For nearly 10 years Nan Holda was administrative manager of the Chemistry Biology Training grant at Illinois, a program that includes six departments but with most trainees coming from chemistry and ChBE. In that role she organized all seminar visits of speakers including the invitations sent out by the students, organized the annual CBI symposium and helped put together two successful renewal applications which are nearly 400 page documents. Nan is also the administrative manager for the local SACNAS chapter which she helps plan activities and events and organizes the attendance of chapter members to the annual conference.

Haijun Yao started as a post-doctoral researcher with Prof. Rauchfuss. He moved into the SCS facilities where he was a joint member of the Microanalysis Facility and Mass Spectrometry Facility, always taking on any tasks that needed to be done.  He then moved exclusively to Mass Spectrometry and has proven himself to be a speedy, efficient, and highly dependable team player who has supported SCS’s research in any and every way he could for 20 years.

SCS is grateful to all of our outstanding employees!