Rutgers students recognized for their professionalism, contribution to university community

When the state was buried under two feet of snow in January, Rutgers University-Newark senior Jeffrey Vazquez was at the center of the school’s traffic safety plan.

Jeffrey Vazquez, a senior majoring in criminal justice at Rutgers University-Newark, was recently named Student Employee of the Year. He has been working in the Community Service Officer program for four years.
Photo: Office of Financial Aid

Vazquez, a supervisor in the Community Service Officer (CSO) program, organized and deployed students from the unit in the Public Safety Department to ensure traffic could pass in and around the university.

A few months earlier in November when President Barack Obama visited Rutgers-Newark for a town hall meeting, Vazquez coordinated with various law enforcement agencies – including the Secret Service and State Police – to help ensure roadblocks were adequately covered.

In between these events, Vazquez, a criminal justice major who is graduating in May, initiated and executed programs and procedures to ensure CSOs are well trained. For example, Vazquez worked with the Newark Police Department to provide bicycle patrol training to community service officers, who are uniformed, unarmed, full-time students working for Rutgers University Police Department. He also created a program to ensure Rutgers medical programs meet federal regulations on safety.

For all of these accomplishments, Vazquez was recently named the undergraduate student employee of the Year.

“Rutgers students truly do amazing work,” said Amy Creteau, associate manager for student employment at the Office of Financial Aid at a recent event honoring student employees and their supervisors. “Today, we celebrate the contributions of these students and their supervisors without whom this university would be hard pressed to run.”

The ceremony, held April 14, recognized Rutgers student employees who work throughout the universities in Camden, Newark and New Brunswick in more than 200 offices or in the three communities. They serve as tutors, research assistants, ushers, graphic artists and computer support assistants among other roles.

For his part, Vazquez said he worked 39 hours weekly, usually in four-hour shifts, in between classes, at night or on weekends. He was even working while he was at the award luncheon.

“You see him texting?” asked his supervisor, Jimmy Rivera, who had nominated Vazquez. “He is reaching out to the supervisors in Newark. We have a power outage, which occurred last night. We have CSOs working right now and we have them working all night long. He’s coordinating with other supervisors.”

Ashley Vega, left, earned second place Employee of the Year award. She received her award from Amy L. Creteau, associate manager for student employment at the Office of Financial Aid.  

Vazquez, who plans to work for the U.S. Army after graduation, seems to have a knack for finding ways to improve the unit’s operation. He said some of his ideas come instinctively while others are developed from on-the-job observation. He sees a need and he fills it. Most importantly, Vazquez said, he learns by asking.

“You have to talk to people,” said Vazquez, who was named student employee of the year for New Jersey by the Northeast Association of Student Employee Administrators. “It’s impossible to come up with every solution by yourself. You need to communicate, get your name out there and talk to as many people as you can and ask their input.”

William Cornelius received the third place Student Employee of the Year award at a ceremony April 14.

Others who were recognized at the ceremony were:

  • Ashley Vega, second place, student employee of the year. Vega, a senior manager for the Student Center Meetings and Events Office, was recognized for her work ethic, managerial skills overseeing her peers and coordinating programs.
  • William Cornelius, third place, student employee of the year. Cornelius works for the Rutgers Healthy Dining Team, a joint program between Rutgers Dining Services and the New Jersey Institute for Food, Nutrition and Health. Cornelius developed The Secret Menu, the newsletter for the dining halls, and initiated Meatless Monday campaign that brought vegetarian dishes.
  • Han Le, graduate student employee of the year. Le, who works for Institute for Families in the School of Social Work, developed a consumer roundtable to help the institute assess housing needs for its employees. She also collected and analyzed date on children’s health.
  • Steven Webb, supervisor of the year. Webb is a fire inspector with the emergency services unit of Public Safety. The students who nominated him lauded his training skills, his caring attitude and a phone call away availability. Webb, they said, has become more than a supervisor to them. He is a mentor.
  • University Career Services, employer of the year award, for providing professional growth and opportunities to student employees.
  • Jennifer Park, special recognition award, for her dedication, discipline and drive. Park created the student employee handbooks in linguistics and anthropology departments.
  • Andres Sierra, the Nadia Schuman Above and Beyond Award, for troubleshooting IT problems in the Office of Financial Aid. But beyond the everyday duties, Sierra also redesigned the internal website of the office and improved the office's emergency preparedness plan.