Olga Salinas, assistant director for the College of Health Sciences’ Student Services and Academic Advising Office, received the 2025-2026 College of Health Sciences Excellence in Staff Leadership Award.
The Excellence in Staff Leadership Award recognizes the integral role that staff contribute in the administration of academic programs through tasks such as serving as role models for staff members; promoting the professional development of staff; performing routine responsibilities and tasks efficiently, effectively, and fairly; mentoring other staff members; working across schools; leading committees; improving policy; or demonstrating academic leadership in the broader college and university context, beyond the advancement of their own area.
“Olga is an indispensable leader whose profound institutional knowledge and wise counsel are critical to the effective administration of our academic advising office,” Maddi Allsop, academic advisor in the college’s Student Services and Academic Advising Office. “Olga serves as the ultimate staff role model and mentor. With her decades of experience, she provides clarity and sound judgment, actively mentoring advisors to ensure consistent, high-quality service. Her consistently warm, kind, and fair demeanor fosters a positive environment daily in our office. Her leadership is most evident in her ability to identify systemic needs and drive impactful change.”
In one example of her leadership on a project, Salinas demonstrated policy leadership by leading the complete redesign of the advising process for required advising holds for new undergraduate students in order to address the high volume of students advisors must see in a semester. This new process was a strategic overhaul that successfully ensured all of the college’s students with required advising holds received vital academic information and were able to register in a timely manner. Crucially, it simultaneously created critical staff bandwidth for continuing student advising and project work, optimizing efficiency across the entire unit.