Award Recipients

Since the beginning of the Pandemic and continuing over the past two years, the CDFM Team has had to take a leadership role in ensuring that the students, faculty and staff of Humber College have a safe and innovative environment. Humber College could not have continued operations and re-opened without the efforts and dedication of the CDFM team ensuring that it was a safe environment. Throughout the pandemic the CDFM team remained on campus and developed work routines that maintained safety and yet kept Humber's buildings operational.

These intensive work routines are still in place today. The CDFM team has had to quickly adapt and revamp learning and working spaces to ensure that physical distancing measure were followed as per the guidelines set by government health authorities. This presented many challenges as a tremendous amount of work had to be done in a short period of time to revamp workspaces, common areas, classroom and labs. To put this into perspective - this is 3 million square feet over two campus locations. T

he CDFM team have been continuously educating themselves to ensure that they have the most current knowledge and understanding of the pandemic in order to ensure that Humber College is a safe environment. This included the creation and installation of partitions and signage throughout the college to promote physical distancing. While adjusting and adapting to the pandemic environment, the CDFM team continued with their aggressive portfolio in managing, updating and expanding projects over two campuses.

The recently approved implementation of the District Energy project at North Campus replaces the old inefficient steam heating system, with a more efficient, less carbon based hot water system. The planning for the project was completed over the past two years, with construction slated to start next fiscal and continue for three years. It is anticipated that this project will result in a 65% reduction in Greenhouse Gas emissions (GHG) for the North Campus.

The CDFM has continuously proven their commitment to going the Extra Mile for Humber College, by providing strategic, innovative leadership that has resulted in $20M in renovations and $200M in new construction over the past two years, while reducing the overall operating costs of the facilities. Their accomplishments has given Humber College the reputation of being a leader in industry standards with achievements in "best in class" and at times "leaders in the industry". Whilst ensuring the priority of the safety of Humber's students and staff.

The Department of Public Safety has been nominated for the President’s "Extra Mile" award for all their work over and above during the COVID-19 Pandemic. Humber’s response to the pandemic emergency was led through a command/control and coordination effort managed through the Emergency Operations Centre and Critical Incident Response Team (CIRT). Both the CIRT and EOC are led by Public Safety.

Additionally, great effort was made to develop systems and protocols that would allow for the safe operation of and attendance at the campuses. The Public Safety team was able to quickly establish restricted access control to the various campuses and buildings, as well as establish a COVID-19 screening process that initially started as verbal questioning of each person that entered the campus. This quickly changed to an app-based screening questionnaire with QR code and then eventually the requirement to verify and validate over 44,000 vaccine certificate submissions.

An additional 60 uniformed security guards were hired and trained to help manage the COVID screening and mandatory mask and vaccine requirements on campus. All this effort allowed Humber to carry-on its mission of delivering high quality training and education to students in the safest way possible. The impact of COVID-19 on campus was significantly reduced due to good planning, tight coordination and cooperation, effective decision making and the ability to execute plans and decisions in a quick and efficient manner. The Department of Public Safety was a significant contributor to the success of the colleges response.

The Financial Services and Planning team have diligently worked in the background to introduce a new budget tool, initiatives that support Humber’s sustainability efforts and help to govern and maintain Humber’s fiscal health and responsibility. This team’s commitment and dedication to Humber’s financial health and operations has provided the College the support that is needed to continue to provide programs and services to our students.

Financial Services and Planning announced the release of the new budget tool to the college for the 2022-23 budget planning period. Humber has partnered with Questica Budget in an all-in-one tool will be a great improvement over previous processes and will improve the annual budget and forecasting process for all budget holders across Humber College.

This team has found ways to adapt to the pandemic and devise ways and devise new process in order to adapt to the work at home activities. The team took this opportunity to initiate a new process that supports Humber’s sustainability effort. As a result, Accounts Payable has developed and implemented the ability to go paperless which has avoided printing approximately 84,000 cheques. Accounts Payable has also increased EFT payments to vendors by 25%. And student refunds that were previously issued via cheque are now issued via e-Transfer.

With the successful implementation of Flywire, the team was able to help decrease the outstanding student balances by $2.7M or 51% compared to prior fiscal year. The total number of uncollected student accounts decreased by 17%. There was an incredible 300% increase in number of payment plans offered to students and a decrease in Bad Debt expense by 99%.

Humber is committed to provide students with an education and with the challenges brought on by COVID, the team has managed $53.6M in deferral tuition payments made by students. The team has worked closely with the Registrar’s Office, Financial Aid and the International team to ensure the best possible experience for current and future students.

The team implemented the travel and expense module in Chrome River to allow staff and faculty the ability to submit out of pocket expenses for reimbursement electronically and therefore, eliminating the need for hard copies and physical signatures when requesting out of pocket reimbursements. The individual has the ability to upload copies of receipts and using features built into the system to calculate mileage and meal allowances as well. The system is integrated with Banner Finance and the approved submission is paid to the individual on a weekly basis via electronic funds transfer (EFT).

Chrome River is also used to reconcile PCard transactions and now both types of expenditures can be managed in the system.

In addition to reacting to the pandemic and adjusting workflows, the team went the extra mile in implementing initiatives that promoted fiscal responsibility, accountability, provided our students an improved user payment experience, our vendors a paperless transaction process and supported Humber’s sustainability efforts. Together the Financial Services and Planning team was able to collaborate, educate and train partners across the College to implement new programs that promoted fiscal responsibility. Thus, providing a strong financial foundation in which Humber can continue to build its academic success upon.

At every crossroads of the pandemic, the People(s) & Culture team demonstrated exceptional initiative, perseverance, accountability, and commitment to ensuring the well-being of students and employees. Members of every People(s) & Culture function worked diligently to advance Humber College's mission and strategic goal of being a healthy campus. The team quickly pivoted to deliver strong and supportive virtual relationships and support to the Humber College community. The efforts of the People(s) & Culture team throughout the pandemic serves as a powerful example of the importance of making a positive difference in the lives of the people we serve, during what can very likely be described as one of the most challenging of times.

At the onset of the pandemic, the People(s) & Culture team immediately transitioned its focus to the needs of Humber employees putting their health, safety and financial security first; the team examined options for creative ways to support employees efficiently and effectively in the ‘new normal.’

Throughout the year, this teams' actions demonstrated:

• Alignment to Humber's core values of courage, innovation and health and well-being for employees and students as a whole.
• Going consistently above and beyond the job requirements to support employees and managers as the College managed and transitioned through the pandemic and the new world of work
• Commitment and dedication to respond to and support the concerns of others
• Dedication to delivering timely, proactive, effective and solutions focussed service
• The earning of the credibility and respect of the Humber community
• Delivering just in time high-quality tools and service to the Humber College Community

 

The Longo Faculty of Business Hospitality Receiving, Retail and Lab Team captures the essence of the extra mile award. This team has worked tirelessly during COVID to uphold health and safety protocols, support student learning in the labs including the Humber Room, distribute food to those suffering from food insecurity and at the same time transitioning over to the new receiving warehouse. This team was one of the first to be back on campus to support in-class learning including the preparation required to recommission the labs, pivoting to the ever changing health and safety protocols, increasing supports to ensure a safe student learning environment, all the while adhering to required safety protocols themselves. This team supports all Culinary, Baking, Hospitality, and Events programs that fall under Longo Faculty of Business along with the Faculty of Science, Health and Wellness Nutrition lab components. Each member of this team possesses great work ethic and dedication towards the department and the strategic pillars of Humber College.

The Hospitality Receiving, Retail and Lab Team were one of the original contributors and continues to this day to support the College’s sustainability initiative around food waste reduction. Two examples of how this team minimizes food waste include:

1. Recovery Kitchen: All unused food products from the labs (due to low student attendance, class cancellations) gets diverted to the Gourmet Express and the Humber Room. The unused product is used to produce fresh, affordable and delicious meal options for the Humber community.
2. Ignite Soup Bar: This department has partnered with Ignite to produce and freeze healthy and free soups to combat student food insecurities at North and Lakeshore campuses.

For a healthy and safe return to work, the staff were instrumental in providing great ideas, most of which have been implemented and continue to be part of the improved operations of today. They helped with the dishwasher training plans and physical set-up of each work areas/lab to ensure Covid-19 restrictions were put in place to safely continue in-person learning. They also assisted with the physical training of new temporary part time support staff and students. They all follow COVID-19 restrictions by wearing PPE's, following the 6ft rule when possible and diligently sanitizing all student and employee areas. All team members became experts in health and safety protocols and could be considered COVID-19 champions in our department. During this already difficult time an additional challenge was presented to the team. They needed to decommission the old receiving warehouse and relocate and commission a new receiving area. This meant, finding new storage areas, moving approximately $2 million worth of food, paper and chemical supplies and tools and equipment. The move went seamlessly because the staff were prepared, organized and worked efficiently during this transition.

The Longo Faculty of Business Receiving, Retail and Lab team have a great work ethic and genuinely care about the students and success of Humber College's programs and reputation. Over the last three years, they have created impactful new protocols and processes that have significantly advanced the department and allowed for the continuation of in person learning throughout the pandemic. In-person learning would not have been possible without the dedication and commitment of this team. In addition, improvements were made to health and safety protocols, sustainability initiatives and increased cross collaboration with other departments at Humber. Their innovated approach to food sustainability not only impacted the Humber community through the Ignite Soup Bar, but also provided support to families with food insecurities across Mississauga and Toronto.

Over the past year, Tyler Charlebois, Tanya Goncalves and Sandra Filice have tirelessly dedicated their time and efforts to establish and operate a vaccination and booster clinic in partnership with William Osler Health System (WOHS). This provided Humber College with an important opportunity to contribute to the fight against the spread of COVID-19 by making the vaccine accessible to staff, students and the surrounding community.

Outside of the scope of their regular roles, Tyler, Tanya and Sandra led the organization of the clinic at the University of Guelph-Humber (UofGH) building from April to August 2021. The clinic increased access to the vaccine to Humber staff, students and the broader community, while providing work-integrated learning experiences for Humber students in various healthcare related programs. Some Bachelor of Nursing students from the Faculty of Health Sciences & Wellness (FHSW) administered vaccinations while other Humber and UofGH students performed clerical duties, including asking screening questions and helping individuals check in and check out.

After the clinic kicked off, it was running so efficiently that Humber was able increase appointments to seven days a week and expand vaccine access to even more community members. Tyler, Tanya and Sandra’s exceptional coordination allowed Humber to hold hours that accommodated essential workers in the community who worked shifts. Humber’s contribution to the community was recognized by local government with Councilor Michael Ford touring the North campus clinic and meeting with staff and students before it opened to the public. Hon. Doug Ford, Premier of Ontario and Member of Provincial Parliament for Etobicoke North also recognized Humber’s efforts:

“The Osler-Humber College COVID-19 Vaccine Clinic is another great example of Ontario’s rapidly increasing vaccine infrastructure. It will be critical to get more vaccines into the arms of Etobicoke residents as quickly as possible and allow us to utilize every resource including our bright and capable Humber College and UofGH students,”

“The partnership between Osler, Humber and UofGH is a great example of the Team Ontario spirit and demonstrates how our health care and post-secondary partners are coming together to stop the spread of COVID-19.”

The Team: Tyler, Tanya and Sandra each played an invaluable role in establishing the vaccine clinics.

Tyler Charlebois, Director, Centres of Innovation Network and Partnership Development, acted as a liaison with the community and local governments to assess the needs and Humber’s ability to provide the service in a safe and functional environment. This often meant reacting within aggressive timelines to organize and coordinate a large team in a short amount of time. A clear example of Tyler’s fast responses and capability is the establishment of the booster clinic this past December. Tyler was in a virtual meeting with Ontario Chambers of Commerce where there was a call to action for booster clinics. Tyler and this team quickly reacted to this request and were able to open and operate a booster clinic at the North Campus on December 21, 22 and January 12, 13, and 18. Over 2,000 booster shots were administered, with December 22 holding a record of administering 1000 in one day.

Tanya Goncalves, Director, I.T. Client Services was instrumental in establishing the network support and booking system that was needed for the scheduling of all students, faculty and volunteers to operate the vaccine clinics. Tanya also directed the appointment booking system and ensured the community could easily sign up and receive appropriate information.

Sandra Filice, Associate Dean, Nursing & Personal Support Worker, FHSW, recruited faculty members and students to operate the clinics. The clinics enabled students to have opportunities to demonstrate competencies and complete work-integrated learning by performing clerical duties alongside their Humber peers, asking screening questions and helping patients check in and out. Bachelor of Nursing students administered vaccines at the clinic, which provided a unique and valuable work-integrated learning experience for students from several healthcare and business-related programs at Humber College.

Establishing, staffing, operating and maintaining the vaccine clinics was in addition to Tyler, Tanya and Sandra’s existing workload. Their collective contribution resulted in:

• 62,000+ Moderna & Pfizer vaccines and boosters administered

• Over 180 Humber & UofGH students in support and clerical roles gaining once in a lifetime experience

• 237 nursing students received clinical experience as vaccinators

• 11,000 volunteer, placement and community service learning hours completed