Fernando receives Employee Kudos Award

April 8, 2022

Alex Fernando

Alex Fernando received the University of Nebraska Board of Regents Employee Kudos Award at the Board of Regents meeting on April 8. 

The Kudos Award recognizes the accomplishments of outstanding employees from across the four University of Nebraska campuses. Shari Veil, dean of the College of Journalism and Mass Communications nominated Fernando for the award. 

Fernando is the assistant director of recruitment in the College of Journalism and Mass Communications at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. In addition to a never-ending Husker Spirit, he was nominated for his extraordinary efforts to build a welcoming and inclusive environment for faculty, staff and students in the college. 

In his role, Fernando attends more than 65 admissions-organized events each year, travels to conferences, attends every Red Letter Day, organizes recruitment mailings, digital campaigns and phone calls, gives daily tours and responds to questions from prospective students and their parents. He does this all while maintaining an extraordinary level of professionalism mixed with a big dash of Go Big Red.

Being a great cheerleader is expected of a college recruiter, but Fernando is so much more. In his two and half years in the role, he has built an outstanding ambassador program, giving 15-20 current undergraduate students the chance to sharpen their presentation and promotion skills. The ambassadors aren’t just giving tours. Fernando finds ways to incorporate the ambassadors into the development of recruitment strategy and planning, ensuring they leave college with leadership experience already under their belt. He is also committed to their growth and advancement and regularly organizes opportunities for ambassadors to engage in professional development as part of their role.

Last spring, working with the ambassadors, Fernando launched a high school mentor program pairing prospective and current students in a series of organized activities designed to help with college and career exploration.

In response to the nationwide protests surrounding the murder of George Floyd, Fernando helped launch a registered student organization, This Circle, to give all students a safe space to meet and discuss issues of concern. At the same time, he took over as the staff adviser to both of the college’s learning communities. In this role, he helps first-year students transition to college and explore their passions by organizing opportunities to meet and interact with other students and faculty.

Fernando has also grown the college’s a la carte workshop program for Nebraska high schools. He arranges for faculty from the college to travel to high school classrooms and give hands-on presentations to students. In his first year in the college, Fernando organized more than 50 workshops and since the pandemic has eased, he is on pace to host one a la carte workshop per week this year.

Fernando has done all this and still finds the time to root for the Huskers on his personal podcast, pursue his master’s in business administration and get a pilot’s license.

“Alex is the epitome of staff excellence at the University,” Veil said. “We are tremendously proud of the work he has done and thrilled to see him recognized with the Employee Kudos Award.” 

To learn more about the University of Nebraska Board of Regents Kudos Award, please visit https://nebraska.edu/regents/awards-and-recognition/kudo-awards