2011 Excellence in Support Services Award

Patrick Hines, database manager in Research, Evaluation, Assessment, and Planning, is the 2011 Excellence in Support Services Award recipient at Durham Tech. Patrick routinely goes above and beyond in responding to inquiries and needs of college staff and faculty. In doing so, he supports the ideals, philosophy and mission of the college by implementing processes and frequently optimizing the use of technology that increases efficiency and accountability. As examples, he has assisted Human Resources with streamlining the payroll transmittal and contract writing processes, has implemented and integrated the planning and budgeting databases of PIP and BEST, as well as the student learning outcomes database. He has implemented the use of Class Climate for in-house student evaluations of instruction and automated several of those processes, and has assisted with implementation of Informer reporting software. He frequently is at work beyond his scheduled work hours and/or works at home to accomplish the goals he has set for himself.

Patrick has found ways to automate a majority of the processes required in both generating and compiling surveys, significantly reducing staff time for the college. He is ingenious in his use of both QueryBuilder and Informer software products and frequently supplements them with his own knowledge of programming code. The efficiencies resulting from consolidation of budgeting and planning processes through the BEST and PIP databases are largely attributable to this employee’s ingenuity.

In addition, he shares his talents as a member of the Techtonics, serves on Planning Council, serves as an advisor to the student gaming organization, and has established the online tracking system for this year’s Year of Service participation hours. He voluntarily tracked and compiled the performance of all teams participating in the Wellness Challenge last year.

Patrick makes technology understandable for technophobes and works patiently with those less technologically advanced so we can learn and benefit from technology. All the while, he does this without sounding patronizing or condescending.

He settles for nothing short of excellence in virtually all that he does. For all of this, we are thankful and pleased to recognize Patrick Hines, database manager in the Research, Evaluation, Assessment, and Planning Department, as the 2011 Excellence in Support Services Award recipient.