Each year, the Dean of the College of Letters & Science offers awards recognizing outstanding performance, service, and contributions by L&S University Staff members.
The L&S University Staff Awards honor staff members for their excellence in the following areas: effectiveness, innovation, creativity, originality, leadership, climate, and service to the university.
We salute and offer congratulations to the winners of the 2025-26 awards:
Kristine Schultz, Department Administrator, Department of Anthropology
Making sure an academic department functions like a well-oiled machine is never an easy task — especially when it involves having to navigate the adoption of a new, campus-wide HR, research and budgeting software system (Workday). But Kristine Schultz handles the challenges with grace and skill, much to the appreciation of the colleagues she serves.
“Without Kris, our unit would be non-functional,” says Sissel Schroeder, the Bradshaw Knight Professor of Environmental Humanities.
As one of the longest-tenured department administrators in the College of Letters & Science, Schultz uses her deep experience and veteran leadership to improve key processes, like switching the department course-planning process so that it’s handled a full year at a time, rather than on a semester-by-semester basis. That kind of big-picture thinking has reduced scheduling problems and made the experience significantly more equitable for both faculty members and teaching assistants.
“Kris spends an incredible amount of time working on the nuts and bolts of how to best organize and run the department office,” says J. Mark Kenoyer, the George F. Dales Jr. and Barbara A. Dales Professor of Anthropology. “She does this with elegance and consideration for each of her colleagues and the overall faculty and students in the program.”
Jeff Nielsen, Building Manager, Department of Chemistry
The Chemistry Complex comprises four separate buildings — the Shain Research Tower, the Daniels Wing, the Mathews Wing and the new Chemistry Tower. Jeff Nielsen manages all of them, making sure the department can offer the spaces and services necessary to teach thousands of undergraduates each year, Over the years, Nielsen has also managed multiple serious challenges that threatened to upend normal operations throughout the department. In 2019, he dealt with a flood that shut down multiple floors of the Mathews and Daniels Wings; he guided the department through the COVID shutdown; and he helped the department recover quickly in 2022, when an air-handling system failed and caused two buildings to shut down.
“Jeff is an essential contributor to the effective functioning of the chemistry department,” says Judith Burstyn, a professor of chemistry and former department chair. “Our buildings are among the most complex on campus to manage, because of the combination of sophisticated laboratory operational requirements and safety issues associated with the use of flammable and hazardous chemicals. Jeff’s expertise in always keeping all systems in the building functioning, his willingness to be on call for emergencies at any time of day or night, and his attentiveness to good safety practices are key to ongoing success in our teaching and research.”
Nielsen’s latest challenge involves supervising major renovations of a sub-basement area to create laboratory space for an incoming faculty member whose research involves sophisticated measurements that require tight temperature and humidity control.
Kathryn Wood, Administrative Assistant, Department of Chemistry
The Department of Chemistry is filled with talented professors and award-winning researchers who are pushing the bounds of scientific discovery on a weekly basis. But those employees had to be recruited to UW at some point, and without a skilled assistant who can manage the complex process of collecting application materials and arranging multiple visits and interviews for as many as 250-400 applicants each year, they might have ended up elsewhere. Kathryn Wood is that skilled assistant.
“Let me be succinct: Faculty only agree to be on the search committee, because Kathryn makes things happen,” says Gilbert Nathanson, professor of chemistry. “Kathryn and faculty are full partners through thick and thin, and it is Kathryn's creative solutions to coordinating every stage of the search that make it possible.”
In addition to her role in the faculty recruitment process, Wood also serves as the coordinator of the department’s Chemistry Education Research (CER) path and its inorganic chemistry path, projects that also require a steady hand and attention to multiple moving pieces.
“Her contributions are woven into every aspect of our teaching, research and community engagement,” says Sam Pazicni, an assistant professor of chemistry who chairs the CER path. “She manages path meetings, oversees purchasing and reimbursements, coordinates travel, and supports the logistics that keep our scholarly work running smoothly. Her work meaningfully enhances the capacity of our faculty, staff and students. We are able to focus on the intellectual heart of our work, because Kathryn ensures that the administrative ecosystem surrounding it is stable, dependable and thoughtfully managed.”
Molly Moen, Assistant to the Chair, Department of Psychology
As the main assistant to department chair C. Shawn Green, the Mark and Ilene Laufman Family Professor of Psychology, Molly Moen is at the center of one of the College’s busiest and most heavily enrolled departments. But her role is far more expansive than just that — she also supports nearly ten other faculty administrators within the department. Even with a full plate, Moen manages to find ways to improve the ways in which the department functions, including managing the scheduling of conference rooms, coordinating the department community-wide meetings that occur every semester, handling new faculty visits and even setting up a plant-sharing system among her colleagues in an effort to add additional greenery to Brogden Hall. In countless ways, Moen has become the face of the department, the person who welcomes visitors and assists students and co-workers.
“Molly’s impact on our department and the university is both foundational and far-reaching,” explains Stephanie Scholze, the department’s career development manager. “I met Molly on the day of my interview — she was the first person in the department to greet me and welcomed me into her office for a warm conversation, while I waited for the interview committee. From that moment forward, she made me feel included and part of the community, which is emblematic of her approach to every interaction.”