Student Employee of the Year 2022
Third Place
Kylie Zarecki
Public Health Nutrition Intern, Dining Services
Hometown: Atlanta, Georgia
Senior, Health Promotion
Kylie started her career with UGA Dining Services as a student employee in Bolton Dining Commons from January to August 2020. Shortly after, she started working with the Food Safety Coordinator and the Registered Dietitian Nutritionist (RDN) in October of 2020 to use her experience in Public Health to create videos highlighting food safety guidelines for dining patrons using to-go boxes. She then transitioned to work exclusively with the RDN in January 2021 to update our food safety training materials and presentations into a digital, video format for all Dining Services employees. This video is to be used to all new employees as part of the food allergen on-boarding training. In the year since, she has taken on the responsibility of Lead Research Assistant for doctoral research headed by the Dining Services Registered Dietitian Nutritionist.
This year, Kylie began organizing and assessing research data for the RDN, and her problem solving and organization skills shined. She was soon asked to become the Lead Research Assistant to coordinate and delegate tasks for the research team which consists of both undergraduate and graduate students. This position requires excellent communication skills; she often has to lead, train, and assign tasks to fellow teammates that work different shifts from her and that may be in the office while she is away in class.
She is a hard worker, often working extra weekend shifts to make sure data is coded correctly, everything is accounted for, and to prepare the tasks for the other 5 student researchers for the next week. We have seen her blossom during her time working in the nutrition office. She has transitioned from a shy student who barely spoke and shook during presentations, to being bold enough to bring up concerns or point out errors in analysis, to now leading research meetings and training fellow students as if she had been conducting research for years. Because Kylie’s responsibilities are more than what is normally expected from a Public Health Intern, two new positions are being created within the department to allow students with this level of professionalism to take on managerial and supervisory roles.
The other students have bonded with her as their leader. They look to her for guidance and respect her input. She is looked to as the expert on how to apply the research skills they are all learning in class, and we hear many times from the other students how grateful and enriching they have found their research experience.
Nominated by: Mariah McDaniel, Dining Services