Jason Koski/University Photography

Staff members with 25 years of service or more and their guests enjoy musical entertainment at the service recognition dinner April 7.

“Imagine what a day at the university would be like without our dedicated staff members,” Cornell Trustee Ezra Cornell said at the 59th annual service recognition dinner April 7 at Bartels Hall.

Cornell enumerated the impact: no one to plow the streets in winter or to make the grounds beautiful during spring, summer and fall; no coffee to drink or food to eat; no news in the Cornell Chronicle and no Web updates; no one to help you install new software on your computer; no one to fix your leaky office roof.

Speaking to the 187 staff members with 25 or more years of service attending the dinner, he said, “You are a part of the history we’re making at Cornell.”

Cornell and his wife, Daphne, recognized 332 long-serving staff members celebrating a fifth-year anniversary at 25 years or more, including 5 staff members celebrating 45 years of service who were unable to attend: Selden Ball, Henry Crans, Sharon de Roos, Carl Moravec and Robert Munch. Seven staff members celebrated 40 years of service and were recognized in a letter from President David Skorton that Vice President Mary Opperman read on his behalf:

• Charles W. Jermy Jr., associate dean of the School of Continuing Education, is “passionate about providing educational opportunities for students of all ages and interests and has taken the lead in establishing online courses for credit.”
• Patricia Marsella-Herrick, research support specialist in plant pathology at the New York State Agricultural Experiment Station in Geneva, “has an outstanding track record of achieving technical success, working as part of a research team and managing the lab with the utmost dedication.”
• George Scofield, who manages the art department at the Cornell Store and is “so helpful that some of our best customers, our art and architecture students, even come back to see him after they graduate.”
• Kadri Sercan, preservation assistant in the library, who has probably handled a million and a half volumes and has “tremendous knowledge of libraries, cataloging and the physical condition of books.”
• Michael Skvarla, user program manager at the Cornell NanoScale Facility, who received the George Peter Award for Dedicated Service in 2012 and served in the Pennsylvania National Guard for nearly 40 years, is “calm, affable and welcoming to everyone.”
• William Srmack, research support specialist in horticultural sciences at the Agricultural Experiment Station in Geneva, New York, is “genuinely passionate about his job,” “an excellent mentor,” and appreciated for “his calm, reasoned approach to any issue that comes up.”
• Denise Wurtenberg, who recently retired after many years with the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, was a stock keeper who made sure the department was well-supplied with chemicals, glassware and other necessary items.