Jennice O’Brien was one of four Supportive Professional Staff members honored with a Presidential Award for Excellence last week.

Upon hearing she won the award, O’Brien said she was excited.

“It was very touching; my supervisor [Melanie Magara] nominated me,” O’Brien said.

O’Brien, a 1996 NIU graduate, works in the Office of Public Affairs as a member of the NIU Web Team. Her responsibilities include maintaining the NIU Web site and updating its content.

She started her career at NIU in 1996 as a member of a team whose responsibility was to build the NIU Web site from the ground up and keep it technologically up-to-date.

In 2005, O’Brien volunteered for the newly issued Web Presence Project, where Magara, assistant vice president for Public Affairs, said the qualities that would make her a leader further developed.

According to the NIU Web site, the project’s ultimate goal is to “create a unified, sustainable presence for the Web sites covered by the scope of the project and to support other administrative and academic departments that choose to participate.”

Magara said it was early in the project when O’Brien emerged as a leader.

“More than any other individual, Jennice O’Brien is responsible for the success of NIU’s ambitious Web Presence project,” wrote Magara in O’Brien’s nomination letter. “Day after day, week after week, for more than two years, Jennice has attended and/or led meetings, forged new partnerships, interpreted the needs of new clients and generally held together an unprecedented experiment in university-wide communications collaboration.”

Magara further articulated many of the outstanding contributions O’Brien continues to provide for NIU.

“Jennice plans, writes, creates and manages the most critical sections of NIU’s most important communications vehicle with near-complete autonomy,” Magara wrote. “Her command of language and technology, as well as her understanding of strategic, ‘big picture’ NIU themes, makes Jennice an invaluable university resource.”

O’Brien’s co-workers not only acknowledge her as an invaluable university resource, but also agree that she is a wonderful person who helps everyone around her.

“It’s been a wonderful experience working with Jennice,” said Mark McGowan, editor of Northern Today. “Jennice is very bright, very knowledgeable, very creative and very thorough. She taught me how to use Web tools necessary for publishing Northern Today on the Web.”

Magara shares a similar positive view of Jennice’s personality.

“Jennice is a team player,” Magara said. “She does not seek the limelight; she’s someone who wants to see everyone succeed.”

O’Brien said she has no desire to leave NIU.

“I really like working here,” O’Brien said. “I like my colleagues, and my husband and I like raising our kids in DeKalb.”

Some of O’Brien’s future goals include creating a new batch of NIYou profiles and a new virtual campus tour.

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