TLT says au revoir to two special team members this spring, including our most capable departmental assistant, Auriel Benford, and one of our team’s mentors and senior instructional designers, Sue Shick, who retires after 15 years at ÐÇ¿Õ´«Ã½.
We are very happy for Auriel, who leaves TLT to work in the ÐÇ¿Õ´«Ã½ Department of Post Grad Planning & Experiential Education department. Luckily for TLT and ÐÇ¿Õ´«Ã½, Auriel will still be around campus in her new position. We wish you the best of luck in your new position, Auriel!
Sue Shick retires from ÐÇ¿Õ´«Ã½ following a very successful career as a scientist, educator, and innovator, not to mention just being a great colleague! She has served as a friend and mentor to many of us in TLT and will be greatly missed.
Since arriving at ÐÇ¿Õ´«Ã½ as an instructional designer and technologist, Sue has done everything from answering service tickets to creating immersive learning experiences in the virtual world application Second Life in projects in the School of Medicine, Nursing, and the Mandel School. Most recently, she has been part of the Interactive Commons team in developing and implementing the HoloAnatomy HoloLens app as well as other educational uses of the HoloLens.
UTech and faculty and staff across the university wish Sue well in the future. She will be retiring together with her husband, Paul Shick, who is leaving his position as a professor of mathematics at John Carroll University.
The following are just a few people who wish to recognize Sue’s contribution to ÐÇ¿Õ´«Ã½ over the years:
I've known and worked with Sue for many years and she is so very talented. From working and designing Second Life, Articulate, and currently HoloAnatomy.
Sue has been the go-to person for instructional design and technology. I have seen her quickly learn software on her own then create instructional materials to train others on her discoveries. She has done live training sessions for many faculty, staff and students, sometimes in challenging situations and delivered the best and most coherent instruction for learners at all levels.
Sue has a great personality and makes you feel comfortable and important with every interaction that you have with her. She has been such a valuable asset to the University and I will miss her as a professional associate and as a friend.
-Victor Guinto, Manager Teaching and Learning Support, Case School of Medicine at Samson Pavilion
Sue Simonson Shick brought many talents, including a wonderful intellectual curiosity, to our many instructional design collaborations. One of the outstanding products of our collaboration was a simulation in the early days of our available platforms - when safe islands in Second Life, and avatars that looked like the actual diverse people that we serve - needed to be designed. We hosted students in a simple office, to engage in a respectful interaction, to conduct a cognitive assessment with "Mrs. Miller" (the first simulation in our family systems curriculum, who ultimately became Ella, the matriarch in a built-out family system). Sue helped me make the practice respectful as she voiced the avatar, including exerting effort to draw a clock. I know she has many academic accomplishments and other notable collaborations with the schools across campus. I think that we petitioned for her to receive an honorary Master of Science in Nursing. Enjoy the screen capture of Sue and one of our students. Sue, please be well and stay curious.
-Evanne Juratovac
Assistant Professor, FPB School of Nursing
Assistant Professor, School of Medicine
Sue is a great colleague and honorary nurse for all she has done for the us at the School of Nursing. Sue’s work with us in designing our hybrid MSN Family Systems Psychiatric Mental Health major that was funded by HRSA. It included creating a virtual multi-generational and multi-ethnic family, as well as designing our synchronous, online seminar sessions. Sue spent hours over the first few years orienting faculty and students to the technology----we started with Adobe Connect. She made herself available to new students in Ohio and other states.
-Diana Morris
The Arline H. and Curtis F. Garvin Professor of Nursing, Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing
Executive Director, University Center on Aging and Health, Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing
Best wishes to Sue as she moves on to the next big project- retirement. We so appreciated the work Sue did on a captivating instructional video for our NIH funded study, GIFT: Grandmother Initiatives in Family Transformation.
-Carol Musil, Dean and Edward J. and Louise Mellen Professor of Nursing
Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing
As Sue’s friend and manager, who has also benefited from her wonderful ideas and experiences as she has mentored me over the years, I just want to say a big thank you to Sue for everything - and I can’t wait to spend time with you crafting and creating for many years to come!
-Tina Oestreich, Assistant Vice President Teaching and Learning Technologies
She is kind, helpful and the consummate professional. Sue’s background in
science and education along with her natural curiosity enable her to assist with projects from a
variety of disciplines. She has been an essential member of the HoloAnatomy and
HoloNeuroAnatomy team and will be sorely missed when she retires.
I wish her a wonderful happy retirement (and hope that she’ll miss us and decide to come
back!!)
-Sue Wish-Baratz, Associate Professor
Department of Anatomy
School of Medicine
When the Mandel School wanted a creative way to teach our students about home visiting, Sue Shick introduced us to the use of virtual reality in Second Life as a totally innovative approach. She provided amazing instructional design consultation, technical assistance, and support opening up a whole new world of teaching and learning to our faculty and students. Sue collaborated with us to build and launch both an urban and a rural scenario that allowed students to practice navigating a home visit. She then built an "orientation to Second Life" site at the Rock Hall and a series of "family therapy offices" that students could use in family session role plays. All of the locations she built showed great attention to detail and allowed for real time interaction. In addition to her work in designing and building these sites, Sue then worked tirelessly with our faculty and students to orient them to Second Life and troubleshoot connection issues with students for whom this was their first experience with virtual reality. As a result of Sue's efforts, we were able to train hundreds of students in these important skills as well as to produce a publication and make numerous presentations at national conferences. We literally could not have done this without Sue's collaboration and support. Thank you Sue!
-Zoe Breen Wood, MSW Associate Professor
Director, Office of Educational Outcome Assessment
Jack, Joseph & Morton Mandel
School of Applied Social Sciences