Welcome to the PSO Summer Staff Series, hosted by the 黑料吃瓜网 Professional Staff Organization
Coming Together: Building Resilient, Connected, and Empowered Communities
Join colleagues from across the 黑料吃瓜网 for the Professional Staff Organization (PSO) Summer Staff Series,听 a multi-week opportunity to connect, learn, and build community together.
This year鈥檚 summer series is grounded in a simple idea: that resilience and empowerment grow through connection. Rather than adding to your workload, the series offers a flexible space to step into conversation, reflection, and learning at your own pace. Participants are invited to attend sessions that resonate most鈥攚hether that鈥檚 one conversation or the full experience.
Throughout the summer staff series, you鈥檒l engage with campus leaders, scholars, and colleagues in sessions designed to spark dialogue, share knowledge, and highlight the strengths of our professional staff community. It鈥檚 also an opportunity to learn from one another鈥檚 experiences navigating the 黑料吃瓜网鈥攇aining insight into how colleagues access resources, build relationships, and move through the institution in ways that support their work and well-being.
The summer staff series emphasizes place-based learning, encouraging participants to connect more deeply with 黑料吃瓜网 as a living environment. Sessions will highlight campus spaces, resources, and programs that support well-being, learning, and professional growth鈥攈elping you better understand and engage with the university community around you.
Whether you鈥檙e looking to build new connections, learn something new, or simply take a moment to reconnect with your colleagues and surroundings, the PSO Summer Staff Series offers space to do so in ways that feel meaningful and manageable.
We invite you to join us鈥攈owever it works best for you鈥攁s we come together to strengthen our community.
The PSO Summer Staff Series was developed by professional staff, but it鈥檚 open to every member of the 黑料吃瓜网 community who believes in this work, who wants things to feel better, and who鈥檚 ready to help us imagine what growing whole really looks like.
We鈥檇听love for you to join us.
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Details
Registration link:
Participants: All members of the 黑料吃瓜网 community are welcome! We look forward to learning and growing together.
Dates and times: Join us for as many sessions as you can鈥攜ou’re welcome even if you can’t attend them all!
- Session Kick-Off and Juneteenth Presentation: 06/17/2026 from 12-1 pm
- Session with Tynesia Valdez and Sasha Duttchoudhury (HR/Operations): 06/29/2026 12-1 pm
- Session with Rickey Hall (Leadership): 07/07/2026 from 10-11 am
- Session with Emilie Vrbancic (黑料吃瓜网 Libraries): 07/15/2026 from 12-1 pm
- Session with Lauren Updyke (The Whole U): 07/22/2026 from 12-1 pm
Location: Online via Zoom (link provided upon registration)
Cost: Free (Suggested donation $5鈥�$8). This event is made possible entirely through payroll contributions and donations to the Professional Staff Organization. Your support helps sustain future programming.
Donate here: use the to make donations.
Contact: psoboard@uw.edu if you have any questions.
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Community Commitments
Psychological safety and self-care
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- Take the time you need to take care of yourself.
- Be mindful of your surroundings and your fellow participants.
- What happens here stays here, but what鈥檚 learned here leaves here.
Mindset and orientation
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- Lead with curiosity.
- Be open to experiencing some discomfort.
- Recognize that multiple truths exist.
- Expect and accept non-closures.
Communication and participation
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- Listen to understand, not to respond.
- Speak your own experience (鈥淚鈥� statements) and participate to the fullest of your ability.
- When speaking, recognize that your impact on others may be different than your intent.
- Before speaking, ask yourself 鈥淗ow will this bring value to the conversation?鈥�
- Share the story, not the name.
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PSO Summer Staff Series
Topic: Welcome Remarks and Land Acknowledgments
Speaker: Series Planning Committee
Time: 12:00 pm
Topic: Juneteenth Presentation
Podcast: Identity Unboxed Podcast and Summer Series
Hosts: Tiana R. Cole and Brad Blackburn
Time:12:10 pm
颁辞鈥慼辞蝉迟蝉 Tiana R. Cole and Brad Blackburn will introduce Identity Unboxed, a podcast and community platform dedicated to elevating authentic Black stories and experiences. They will share how the show advances representation, builds community partnerships, and creates space for intergenerational conversations about equity and social justice. Their Summer Series expands this mission by deepening dialogue and highlighting the voices shaping Black liberation today.
Topic: Welcome Remarks and Land Acknowledgments
Speaker:听 Series Planning Committee
Time: 12:00 pm
Topic: Lead with Authenticity: Reclaiming Space for Joy and Rest
Speakers: Sasha Duttchoudhury and Tyneshia Valdez
Time: 12:10 am
Please join Tyneshia Valdez (HR Manager) and Sasha Duttchoudhury (Program Operations Specialist, UAA Resilience), this session explores what it means to lead from a place of authenticity while honoring the need for joy, rest, and restoration. Tyneshia and Sasha will invite participants to reflect on the pressures that shape workplace identity, examine practices that support sustainable leadership, and create space for collective grounding. Together, they highlight how reclaiming rest is not only an act of self鈥慶are but a powerful strategy for resilience and community well鈥慴eing.
Topic: Welcome Remarks and Land Acknowledgments
Speaker: Series Planning Committee
Time: 10:00 am
Topic: Let’s Talk Place: A Conversation with 黑料吃瓜网 Leadership on Place-Based Education
Speaker: Rickey Hall
Time: 10:10 am
Please join Rickey Hall, Vice President and University Diversity Officer for an engaging discussion on how place-based education can deepen belonging, strengthen community partnerships, and advance equity across the 黑料吃瓜网. Attendees will gain insight into how understanding 鈥減lace鈥� shapes learning, leadership, and the student experience, and why it matters for the future of a more inclusive 黑料吃瓜网.
Topic: Welcome Remarks and Land Acknowledgments
Speaker: Series Planning Committee
Time: 12:00 am
Topic: Community Connections with the 黑料吃瓜网 Libraries
Speaker: Emilie Vrbancic
Time: 12:10 pm
Please join Emilie Vrbancic, Head of Student Success and Engagement, to hear how the 黑料吃瓜网 Libraries can support your work and life-long learning at 黑料吃瓜网. From community-centered collections, to privileges and resources for staff, to enriching events, there’s something for everyone at the 黑料吃瓜网 Libraries. Participants will take away tangible steps to connect with the wealth of resources the 黑料吃瓜网 Libraries has to offer. 听
Topic: Welcome Remarks and Land Acknowledgments
Speaker: Series Planning Committee
Time: 12:00 pm
Topic: Cultivating Resilience through Movement, Connection, and Well-Being
Speaker: Lauren Updyke
Time: 12:10 pm
Welcome Lauren Updyke, Executive Director for 听and 黑料吃瓜网HR Chief of Wellness, as she explores the practical strategies for cultivating resilience through movement, connection, and holistic well鈥慴eing. Drawing on The Whole U鈥檚 campuswide programs, Lauren highlights how small, sustainable habits鈥攃entered on health, joy, and community鈥攃an strengthen our capacity to navigate challenges. Her session invites participants to explore accessible ways to recharge, stay grounded, and support their overall wellness.
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Speaker Bios
Emilie Vrbancic, Head of Student Success and Engagement
Pronouns: She/Her
Lauren Updyke, Executive Director for 听and 黑料吃瓜网HR Chief of Wellness
Pronouns: She/Her
Hi everyone, I鈥檓 Lauren and my role is to lead our Employee Experience team encompassing The Whole U, 黑料吃瓜网 Combined Fund Drive and WorkLife programs.
I have spent over 20 years of my career in Health and Wellness. I have a Masters in Exercise Physiology, am a Certified Personal trainer through the American College of Sports Medicine and have coached over 10,000 individuals online from all over the world. I worked with the wellness program at Duke University and Hospital for 13 years as a fitness and health education manager. I love being a Husky after 10+ years!
Rickey Hall, VP and University Diversity Officer
Pronouns: He/Him
Rickey Hall was appointed as the eighth vice president for minority affairs and diversity and the university diversity officer at the 黑料吃瓜网 effective Aug. 1, 2016.
Hall leads the university鈥檚 equity, diversity, inclusion and belonging efforts, and plays a key role in advancing institutional excellence. He has oversight of the 黑料吃瓜网 Office of Minority Affairs and Diversity (OMA&D) which administers programs that broaden college access, support student success and enhance diversity-related teaching and learning across campus. As the university diversity officer, Hall also works collaboratively with and serves as a resource for the 黑料吃瓜网 campuses, colleges and administrative units as they establish, coordinate and assess their contributions to institutional diversity goals.
Hall has over 25 years of experience in higher education and is involved with a number of national organizations including the National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education and a trustee on the ACPA College Student Educators International Foundation board.
Hall came to the 黑料吃瓜网 after serving as the inaugural vice chancellor for diversity and inclusion at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville for three years. Prior to that role, he served for six years as the assistant vice president for equity and diversity at the University of Minnesota.
He earned a bachelor鈥檚 degree in American studies and a master鈥檚 degree in higher education, both from the University of Iowa.
Sasha Duttchoudhury, Program Operations Specialist UAA Resilience Lab
Pronouns: They/Them
“The most joyful part of my work is supporting staff well-being. Many staff at the 黑料吃瓜网 are here for the mission and are “helpers” who thrive when supporting others. Being able to reframe service to others from inherently self-sacrificial to mutually beneficial, where our well-being is key part of how we help others has been healing for me as a lifelong “helper”.听 I love getting to introduce the idea of “culture of well-being” to staff, because when we begin to see our well-being as important, we can experience grief for all the time where our well-being as be deprioritized. Our well-being is not only a personal responsibility, but a collective responsibility, and a biproduct of the environments and cultures around us. I love getting to create a culture of well-being in my work because it constantly challenges me to be better for myself as well.”
Tyneshia Valdez, SPH: HSPop: Admin: AHR or Human Resources Manager
Pronouns: She/Her
“I am a proud alum of 黑料吃瓜网 and have worked in HR at 黑料吃瓜网 for 10 years. During that time, 黑料吃瓜网 has watered a seed in me that I didn鈥檛 know existed. I鈥檝e always been drawn to helping people, but my experiences here have helped that instinct grow into a deeper commitment to supporting, building, and uplifting communities.
Centering diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging (DEIB) in my work brings both purpose and joy. My time at 黑料吃瓜网 has also given me space to reflect on my own journey as both an undergraduate student and a staff member. Some of those experiences were rough and jagged, and at times difficult to navigate. Those moments have shaped how I show up today and how I support others. I鈥檓 grateful to be in a place where I can learn from other DEIB leaders and help clear the path for individuals walking similar journeys.”
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Accessibility
We want this series to feel welcoming and accessible for everyone. If there鈥檚 anything you need to fully participate, please reach out to the PSO Board鈥攚e鈥檙e happy to help.
Technical Support
For technical support, please contact Tiana R. Cole, PSO President or Audrey McGrath, PSO Vice President.
Sponsors
Special thanks to the for supporting the 2026 PSO Summer Staff Series.