This year's Crisis Communications Award goes to Associate Provost Katherine Galvin. Katherine’s full title involves something about “administrative affairs,” but it should say something about cleaning up other people’s messes…or ensuring that we can all be proud to say we work here. If something bad has happened to or involving the integrity of our people and programs, you can bet that we’ve consulted Katherine on how to handle it.
Katherine is smart AND wise – two very different skills. Mike Helenthal in our news bureau says “Katherine responds to inquiries like no one else I work with on campus. If you need an answer or to be pointed in the right direction, even if it has nothing to do with her, she is the first I'd call. If she doesn't know the answer, she is quick to suggest someone who might, and her direction is almost always spot-on. One of her most valuable attributes is that she is honest and trusts the people she works with. She doesn't think she is the only one capable of producing a positive outcome, a trait that empowers those around her.
In my own experience with Katherine, I have found her to be one of the calmest, most thoughtful people I have ever met. She never says an unkind word about anyone, and she always sees the bigger picture – even in the chaos of a crisis. She sees her role not just as helping the university respond to crises, but as preventing them so we don’t have to respond at all.