Accolades

Audrey Murrell, a professor of Business Administration, Psychology, Public and International Affairs at Pitt, has been named the 2021 Onyx Woman Leadership Awards Woman of the Year.

The Pittsburgh-based OWN: Onyx Woman Network was created by Ola Jackson in 1991 as a career, entrepreneurial and financial platform for women of color. Later, the network expanded into television by producing shows featuring women who shared their experiences and advice about issues that impacted your quality of life.

The leadership awards, which were presented on July 11, are for women who empower other women and are from the state of Pennsylvania.

Murrell, when asked by Onyx about what role other women played have in her success, said: “Women are powerful allies as they understand how to balance the mind and the heart in helping others striving toward mutual success. Women are strong collaborators who pour into others and then celebrate their success. Some of my most invaluable and impactful mentors throughout my career have been women. 

Murrell also has served as acting dean of the Honors College, associate dean of the College of Business Administration and director of the David Berg Center for Ethics and Leadership during her 34 years at Pitt.

Professor of Medicine Toren Finkel is one of eight physician-scientists awarded a 2021 Scholar-Innovator Award from the Harrington Discovery Institute. 

Finkel, who is also director of the Aging Institute of UPMC, researches mitochondrial function, cellular metabolism, oxidative stress and aging.

The Harrington Discovery Institute seeks to accelerate the development of new treatments to address major unmet needs in medicine and society. Harrington scholar-innovators are accomplished physician-scientists whose research demonstrates innovation, creativity and potential for clinical impact. 

In addition to grant funding, scholar-innovators receive guidance and oversight in all aspects of drug development.

If you visited a doctor by video chat during the pandemic, you had an experience with the field known as telehealth or telemedicine. Pitt’s University Library System (ULS) recently published a new edition of the International Journal of Telerehabilitation, which has open access articles about changes in the field during COVID-19, as well as telehealth in school settings. 

ULS has been publishing research and clinical practice articles in this field since the journal’s inception in 2008. 

Chris Clifford, who has spent most of his career overseeing auxiliary services at colleges and universities, has been named associate vice president for business affairs and director of auxiliary services at Pitt–Bradford.

Clifford, who began his position June 16, is responsible for the overall administration and leadership of Pitt-Bradford’s auxiliary operations, including Dining Services, housing and auxiliary facilities, laundry and vending, the Panther Shop, Conference Services, and the Mail Center. He also will provide strategic planning and vision for financial, operational, marketing and facility development.   

Before arriving at Pitt-Bradford, Clifford served as vice president for budget and finance at Sul Ross State University in Alpine, Texas, a university similar in size to Pitt-Bradford, where he oversaw all of the university’s financial areas as well as dining and bookstore operations.

He also has experience working at large institutions. For eight years, Clifford served as the associate vice president in the Business and Auxiliary Services Division at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where he supported 21,000 students, 23,000 employees and the UAB Health System, one of the five largest academic medical centers in the United States. At UAB, Clifford oversaw multiple areas, including UAB’s Educational Foundation, real estate, bookstore, parking and transit, physical security, and the school’s 8,600-seat Barstow Arena.

Clifford also served in leadership roles at Ohio University, West Virginia University at Parkersburg, and Mississippi State University and worked for nine years for ExxonMobil, including a three-year assignment in Hong Kong.   

Clifford holds a master of business administration from Dartmouth College and a bachelor’s degree in accounting from Mississippi State University.

The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers has honored Pitt’s Rory Cooper with its Biomedical Engineering Award for his “extensive contributions to wheelchair technology that have expanded mobility and reduced secondary injuries for millions of people with disabilities.”

Cooper, Pitt’s first-ever assistant vice chancellor for research for STEM-health sciences collaborations and founding director of the Human Engineering Research Laboratories, among many other titles, is also an elected fellow of the National Academy of Inventors, the American Association for the Advancement of Science and several other professional societies.

“This award is shared by my students (past and present), family, friends and colleagues within the Human Engineering Research Laboratories," Cooper said of the IEEE honor.

Interdisciplinary researchers at the Swanson School of Engineering are recipients of $1.6 million in advanced nuclear energy research and development funding from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). 

The investment announced this week is part of more than $61 million in awards for 99 advanced nuclear energy technology projects nationwide, $58 million of which was awarded to U.S. universities. According to DOE, the projects focus on nuclear energy research, cross-discipline technology development and nuclear reactor infrastructure to bolster the resiliency and use of America’s largest domestic source of carbon-free energy.

“Pittsburgh is the global nexus of peacetime nuclear energy history and research, and we are proud to contribute to its continued success,” said Brian Gleeson, the Swanson School’s Harry S. Tack Professor and Department Chair of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science. “Our faculty and students have a strong foundation in modeling and simulation, materials, sensing technologies and non-destructive evaluation of critical reactor components, and so we are thankful to the DOE for supporting our research.”

Read more about the Pitt projects funded.

Assistant Professor Nikhil Bajaj has been awarded $450,000 from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission to develop a nationally recognized nuclear research program and grow the overall nuclear program at the University of Pittsburgh.

The grant will support Bajaj in establishing research in advanced sensors and artificial intelligence for reactor applications, specifically high temperature, high-reliability sensor designs using machine learning and advanced communication technology. 

Effective July 12, Laura Schmid will serve as the director of shared services in the Office of Human Resources (OHR). In this role, she will oversee the development and execution of strategic plans within shared services and continue to evolve OHR’s operational performance to cultivate a culture of consistent process improvement and optimization.

Schmid is an experienced administrator with an extensive background in higher education. She specializes in a multitude of disciplines including project management, operational process analysis, efficiency improvement, organizational design and strategic planning. She most recently served as the director of personnel at the Graduate School of Public Health.

Rick Esch, vice president for business affairs at Pitt–Bradford, was chosen by his fellow staff members to receive the Staff Recognition Award for his leadership in helping the campus navigate the COVID-19 pandemic.           

“We never would have gotten through this challenging time without Rick,” said Catherine Koverola, Pitt–Bradford’s president. “He is the bedrock of Pitt–Bradford and embodies servant leadership.”

Esch was nominated for the award by Kathy Moonan, manager of accounts payable who has worked with Esch for many years; James Baldwin, vice president for enrollment management; and Pat Frantz Cercone, executive director of communications and marketing.

“His leadership enhanced the safety and well-being of all concerned during a time when almost everything was uncertain,” Moonan wrote in her nomination.

For nearly 18 months, Esch, who oversees budget and financial reporting, auxiliary services and facilities management, has represented the Bradford and Titusville campuses on the Chancellor’s Resilience Steering Committee and has worked closely with Pitt’s COVID-19 Medical Response Office. He also has collaborated with local, regional and state agencies, including the McKean County and Crawford County Emergency Management agencies, UPMC and Bradford Regional Medical Center.

Esch also assembled and led a COVID-19 Mitigation Response Team, which included representatives from most offices at Bradford and Titusville. Under his leadership, the team successfully implemented many changes on campus, including testing asymptomatic students weekly; isolating and quarantining symptomatic students; adapting the physical plant, including the dining hall and classrooms, to enable physical distancing; purchasing masks, signage and other materials; and identifying vaccinations sites.

“It shouldn’t be forgotten,” Cercone added, “that Rick did all of this while still performing all of his other important duties.”

Esch, who is a 1983 Pitt–Bradford alumnus, started his career at his alma mater in 1994 as the director of auxiliary services. In 1999, he was named chief business and administrative affairs officer, and in 2003 was promoted to vice president for business affairs.

He holds a master of business administration from the Katz Graduate School of Business and a Bachelor of Science in environmental science from Pitt–Bradford. 

The annual Staff Recognition Award honors employees whose performance consistently exceeds the standards and expectations set for their position at the university or whose work in the community surpasses the expectations of the organizations for whom they serve and whose commitment and effort have made a significant impact on the community.