by Shannon Gleba, Staff Writer

The 2018-2019 academic year has brought staff and faculty changes to Manhattan College with the hiring of many new professionals to fill vacant roles in a number of different departments on campus.

Anne Mavor – Director of Health Services

On Nov. 1, 2018, Manhattan College welcomed Anne Mavor as the Director of Health Services.

After spending many years at a previous university, Mavor has extensive experience in treating college-aged adults, and many other aspects of being a Director, like managing immunization records.

“I am in charge of the supplies and the immunization compliance. We have two jobs, one is immunization compliance. We are the place where everyone has to submit their vaccination records, its the state law. There is a 30 day grace period, so I have to manage that,” said Mavor.

When beginning at MC, Mavor wanted to work towards the College’s vision of having Health Services work towards becoming more of a wellness center.

“We are trying to make it more of a Wellness Center, right now we spend most of our time seeing sick students. Last year they added a part-time nurse practitioner, so that they would free up the director to do some more outreach, to spend some time on education, other parts of the position that needed to be looked at.”

She continued.

“My vision was to see maybe where we could make this go more towards wellness and kind of partner with counseling. So, my goal was to begin collaborating more and see what we could do.”

As the Director of Health Services, Mavor hopes to educate the student population on ways to maintain good health.

“Part of the Lasallian mission is to walk the journey of the students in their journey, and even though we are student life, we are really here to educate the students, even though we are not faculty,” said Mavor.

While Health Services does see many sick students, she hopes students will use the advice they are given to make better health decisions in the future.

Mavor said, “One of my goals is when students come in with a variety of different problems, again college-related and age-appropriate illnesses, how can I teach them maybe not to get sick next time or when to use [Health Services]?”

Within the next year Mavor has many ideas, including organizing a team of student volunteers to help communicate with the student population on topics within Health Services. Likewise, Health Services is hoping to encourage students to get their flu shot to hinder the spread of sickness this time of year.

“Next year, we are looking to do a bigger flu shot campaign, so I am always looking to get a flu vaccine to as many students as possible, said Mavor.

Mavor is very happy with her new position and with Health Services’ new space in Horan Hall following a their move at the start of the academic year.

Mavor said, “My favorite part is interacting with the students and my co-workers, I really like it here. I feel like everybody works together, everybody has the same goal, we want the students to be successful.”

Carlos Tonche – Registrar

In late May of 2018, Carlos Tonche started as the Registrar, bringing knowledge from over twenty years of experience to Manhattan College’s Registrar’s Office.

As part of the support office, Tonche is able to collaborate with a number different areas of campus to promote the success of students.

“We support the student in their goals to finish or get their educational goals accomplished. It is just as important to support the other folks in the college community who support students.”

The office is most directly involved with class registration and graduation, but their impact is felt in many different aspects of the student experience.

“So, from a direct point of view, from a student’s perspective, we probably see the two biggies are registration, because we have to set that up or if they encounter any issues online and all that, that is one that we do periodically, obviously.

He continued.

“And the other is graduation because we kind of help with that and putting together your diplomas and so forth. So those are the two direct interactions we have, but we help with anything from classroom assignments, the DegreeWorks, transcripts for alumni or people who need it for jobs. It touches on many different areas, but our goal is to be supportive so things don’t go wrong. If things do go wrong, unfortunately they do, [our goal] is to solve them and communicate as best we can so we don’t repeat those mistakes.”

There are many similarities among the process the Registrar’s Office has at MC and other colleges.

Tonche said, “Different flavors, different systems, but the bottom line is that Registrar’s office have more similarities than differences, in terms of maintaining and preserving the academic records. I have a lot of experience in that field.”

Tonche finds in very important to make positive changes to the system, but also to understand that some processes work well the way they are.

“My goal coming here to Manhattan College at the end of May was to respect what’s been done before, because in order to really be effective it is good to understand what the culture is, because obviously Manhattan College has been around for a long time, Tonche said.

He continued, “Ideally my goal is is to bring my experience to help move it in an even better direction as best we can.”

One way Tonche hopes to better assist students and faculty is through the use of technology.

“The goal is to move forward in ways that make sense, to incorporate technology that is inevitable pretty much everywhere, incorporate it in ways that help, because it is a tool and we have to make sure we use it as best we can to maximize the advantages of the technology,” said Tonche.

One technological change Tonche was able to implement was the way information is passed between professors, deans’ and the Registrar’s Office, using the computer system Banner Workflow.

“A tool within the system called Banner Workflow that is a way of moving things along electronically versus the paper, said Tonche.

Tonche also hopes to stop using an outside vendor to print student diplomas, but rather print them within the office using a system called Diplomas on Demand.

“We will be able to print our own diplomas here, later, if there is an error we can reprint pretty immediately and have it all done with minimal waste and greater flexibility,” said Tonche.

Tonche is very eager to continue working to help students and faculty in their academic careers.

Tonche said, “I have been very happy with Manhattan College. I think folks have been very helpful and welcoming and I look forward to good things working together for the students and the community.”

Jay Ahmed- Director of Fitness and Wellness

After operating without a director for most of the Fall 2018 semester, Manhattan College’s Fitness Center welcomed Jay Ahmed as the Director of Fitness and Wellness on Dec. 3.

In this role, Ahmed is responsible for running the daily operations of the center, including maintaining equipment and the hiring and training of student workers. The fitness center is almost entirely employed by student workers, which is very important to Ahmed in order to provide students with hands-on experience.

“It really is [important], because for me being in this type of industry and setting, I see it as a great opportunity for me to provide mentorship to students,” said Ahmed.

Since beginning at the College, Ahmed was able to make big strides in promoting the group exercise classes on campus. These classes include yoga, zumba and total body, among others.

Ahmed said, “I was able to start our group exercise program again. I saw that as a great area for me to work on and we already had the resources as far as instructors, so it was really just facilitating the group exercise schedule.”

Since the start of the semester, the classes have seen as many as 30-40 consistent participants.

“Group exercise is a great part of our fitness program. I had a feeling it would do well, and the fact that so many members showed up and are consistently going definitely makes it an area I plan to grow,” said Ahmed.

In the long-run, Ahmed hopes to encourage even more members to come to the Fitness Center and wants to focus on more programming for students. Another example of programming in the Fitness Center is different incentive challenges for prizes, such as the recent burpee challenge.

“A big thing for these these little incentive challenges that we do is to motivate the members to keep coming to the gym and continue what you’re doing. My other goal in that is exposing them to a new piece of equipment or an exercise they haven’t done,” said Ahmed.

Also, another goal of Ahmed is to offer more wellness opportunities to help students and faculty stay healthy.

“I plan to do workshops and the topics can be based on what the interest is, we can maybe take a survey from the members and see what they may be interested in. In the fall, I would like to do something for the freshman class, for some students that might not have had access to a gym previously. So that would be a great fitness or wellness 101 where I would provide them an orientation on fitness or any other wellness topics,” said Ahmed.

Tara Fay-Reilly: Director of Undergraduate Admissions

After working for over 15 years in higher education, Tara Fay-Reilly began her role as the Director of Undergraduate Admissions at Manhattan College on Nov. 1, 2018.

The opportunity for this new position was exciting for Fay-Reilly, especially because of the college’s reputation for social justice and service.

“Growing up in the city and having had family and friends who attended Manhattan College and then have been so successful in their career, I was very excited to be a part of that for future generations to come,” said Fay-Reilly.

In her new position, Fay-Reilly’s main responsibility is to oversee recruitment of first-year students to meet enrollment goals. This requires her to work with different members of the MC faculty and staff to ensure the admissions process is streamlined and efficient.

In order to complete the files of prospective students and notify students of acceptance to MC, Fay-Reilly must work with the Operations team. In addition, she collaborates with Athletics, and Catering to hold events like Accepted Students Day.

These events are important to promoting the meaningful relationships she believes the Admissions team should have with prospective students.

Since the beginning of her time working in higher education, Fay-Reilly has always loved the ability to connect with a student at the beginning of the application process and to watch them grow throughout their undergraduate experience.

“It’s a wonderful feeling,” said Fay-Reilly.

Since beginning at the college, Fay-Reilly has been sure to promote team-building among recruiters and the rest of her team, since the job can sometimes feel like a one-man show.

Fay-Reilly said, “I have a great team, and I love working with them. There is a lot of diversity in our team and it is wonderful having all of these minds in one place.”

She also describes her team as, “hardworking, dedicated and good at what they do.”

In the near future, the Admissions Office has been planning some events to welcome prospective students to campus. They are making some changes to the usual event schedule and are offering an Accepted Students Day one Sunday in April to accommodate parents who are working during the events which are typically held on Wednesdays.

Likewise, Admissions will be holding an O’Malley School of Business Preview Day to allow prospective business students to speak with current students, alumni and professors.