The Dean is pleased to recognize COS Assistant Marketing Director Courtney Marie McCreedy as the recipient of this month's Excellence in Mastering Challenges Continuously (E=mc²) Award! This award was established by Dean Quintanilla to recognize outstanding efforts among full-time staff members within the College of Science and its departments.

Citing her success in maintaining a consistently growing platform for the College of Science for six years as our full-service marketing team of one, Dean Quintanilla also noted that he especially commends her for "all the behind-the-scenes spadework that was needed to pull off the TOTALITY AWESOME outreach events last month, which drew about 2,000 visitors from the community."

TOTALITY AWESOME, two day-long events hosted in anticipation of the 2024 total solar eclipse, was indeed a success, drawing students, families, and alumni alike to EESAT to absorb science education, raising more than $4,000 for scholarships and astronomy education at UNT and distributing thousands of eclipse glasses to the community for free. One attendee left the comment, "I was completely and totally impressed with the Pre-Eclipse party and all the collateral surrounding it (the goodies, the experiments, the planning). I'm proud to be an alumnus of a school that works to include the local community and to get different departments together as one team!"

Prior to her hire in December 2017, CMM worked at an advertising agency where she handled copywriting, social media management, commercial scripts, and video production for a wide variety of local and national clients, from Little Guys Movers to the U.S. National Forest Service. She said her favorite project she ever worked on was a video series for the Denton Animal Shelter, in which she crafted all the props herself and cast her own beloved cat as the talent due to budget constraints.

In her six years employed at UNT, CMM has steadily grown awareness and engagement for the College of Science both online and off. She is responsible for external communications like newsletters, social media, web assets, and advertising materials, which usually includes not only conducting all necessary research, interviews, and writing but also executing or sourcing photography, video, and design for projects as well. She is the COS liaison for UBSC and UNT Advancement, attending all meetings and trainings required to properly maintain UNT branded assets, news dissemination, messaging, and fundraising. Her on-campus office is a circus tent in Hickory Hall full to the brim with six years' worth of various promotional materials, COS merch, donor gifts, and event supplies.

Anyone who has worked with CMM knows she loves to create a detailed planning brief and corresponding calendar to effectively coordinate a project. Her day-to-day tasks often involve organizing and disseminating information within the college. She also helps develop internal reports, presentations, and events and regularly provides trainings and guidance regarding social media, branding, event promotion, communication plans, and project management.

"She listens carefully to every idea, big and small, and uses her experience and creativity to turn those ideas into reality," said Dr. Rebekah Purvis, who (along with CMM and Ryan Bennett) comprised the team of three that orchestrated the TOTALITY AWESOME events. "One thing that makes collaborating with Courtney Marie so great is her enthusiasm for the college and the university. These events are going to be what students, staff, and faculty remember about their time at UNT, and we could not have executed them on this scale without her!"

Under the leadership of Dean Su Gao in 2018, CMM developed and organized the college's SMART Talks, a biannual TED-talk-style lecture series celebrating "Science & Mathematics Advancing Research & Technology." She assists the college's advancement team in numerous annual and ongoing fundraising campaigns, engagement events, and board meetings. She has written hundreds and hundreds of announcements, social posts, bios, scripts, web content, and in-depth profiles celebrating the accomplishments of our outstanding faculty, staff, students, and alumni. (In case you didn't know, anyone in the college can suggest stories, spotlights and news leads to CMM via this form, or by simply emailing her at courtney.mccreedy@unt.edu!)

During her time at UNT, CMM has served on and participated in a number of university committees and resource groups, including UNT's We Mean Green Fund, the College of Science's IDEA Council, COS CASE Committee, UNT Neurodivergent Professional Network, and UNT's GS ERG.

Two truths and a lie: Instead of having normal hobbies, CMM is an avid typewriter enthusiast and has at least twenty machines in her possession at any given time. CMM tends to five babydoll sheep named after famous nuns and a miniature peach orchard, for four and ten years respectively. In her spare time, CMM is writing a book about surviving a cult.

When asked if she wished to comment on this welcome acknowledgement of her hard work, CMM said she was also quite pleased with how the events turned out, honored to receive this award and grateful for awesome coworkers, and expressed appreciation for everyone's patience with her slightly lagging email response time as she adjusts to life-after-eclipse.

If you'd like to nominate a deserving staff member for the next E=mc² award, please complete this nomination form.