As you know, Dr. Jeff Walline will be the college’s interim dean beginning January 1, 2024. Jeff will be located in Fry 635. Please contact Carol Wilcox to have access to Jeff’s schedule.

Please plan to have your Pcard purchases in place prior to the end-of-business on Friday, December 22. Bethany Lorenz and Tina Gossard will be away from the office December 27-29. If you need to purchase anything that week, be sure to reach out to Kate Horton.

This year marks the return of the College of Optometry Holiday Party Potluck! Please join us for a festive and fun lunch in Hamilton Hall (Rooms 80 and 90) on Wednesday, December 20 from 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. The college will provide barbeque pork, beef and black bean burgers from City BBQ, as well as paper goods and beverages. To go with the barbeque, please bring a potluck dish to share. Hamilton Hall 90 will be open all morning on the day of the party, so you can drop off your dish at any time. There will be plenty of outlets if you would like to plug in a crockpot.

Please be sure to redeem your $50 electronic Amazon gift card from Virtual Incentives by December 16. Contact Carol Wilcox if you have any questions.

When parking the 11th Avenue garage, please make every effort park on the fourth floor or above, preserving spaces for patients of Optometry and Dentistry on the lower levels.

Human Resources is introducing four new retirement videos to help new and current employees save for the future. New faculty and staff can learn more about selecting a mandatory retirement plan. Current employees can better understand their retirement plan and how to manage investments as well as learn about fees and how they impact your retirement savings. Learn more about investing in your future. Click on this link to take you to an OHR website for further information. New retirement videos help current, new faculty and staff – Human Resources at Ohio State (osu.edu)

The legal implications of smart email management are the most important reason to establish good habits. If you mass-delete emails, you may inadvertently delete data that you should retain. A small number of staff in HR and legal roles are aware that their email messages are flagged for “legal hold,” to ensure we retain documents that would be required for Discovery in the event of future legal proceedings, but most of us need to be mindful of what we keep and delete. Setting up email archiving and folders and using retention tags will give you access to data for as long as you are required to retain it according to university retention schedules. For tips on how to get started, follow this link to the OTDI web site. Email Management: Why It’s Important and How to Get Started | Office of Technology and Digital Innovation (osu.edu)

Megan Larger is currently serving as our interim HR Consultant. Many of you may be familiar with Megan, since she previously served as our interim HR Consultant during Kim Oyer’s leave of absence last year. Megan brings a wealth of HR experience and has familiarity and knowledge of Optometry’s team structure and needs. Please contact Amy Malone if you have any questions.