Employee of the Month - October 2022
Sovandany “Dany” Wang - Student Account Specialist, Student Financial Services
Awarded Thursday, October 13, 2022, via Zoom Virtual celebration. Dany was joined by President Jane Close Conoley, Associate Vice President of Financial Management Milton Ordoñez, Director of Student Financial Services Suzie Payne, and numerous Financial Management and cross-divisional colleagues.
Although Dany Wang has only worked in CSULB’s Financial Management (FM) area for a year, she has quickly demonstrated the proven ability to get things done with tact and diplomacy and through interpersonal connection with students and colleagues.
Dany joined Student Financial Services within FM in October 2021 as an Account Technician III. In her role, she worked with third-party sponsorships that helped students with tuition costs. These include any type of outside entity that covers a student’s tuition, such as Veterans Affairs (VA), foreign countries, and the Department of Rehabilitation.
Dany thrives in being the middleman for the students, networking with departments on campus, like the Bob Murphy Access Center, to assist in smoothing out the billing process for students. Also, in this role, Dany has loved working with VA students, giving them the peace of mind to know she will handle their VA benefits while she reassures them to focus on their education. She took helping VA students very personally as her brother served in the military.
She stood out to her fellow colleague, Kevin Hall, a Student Account Analyst. He shared, “Dany has been instrumental in helping me resolve student account issues… She is always asking questions to learn more about how she can help students and to better understand the overall mission of Student Financial Services.”
Sandy Baños, the School Certifying Official/Veterans Advisor in Veterans Services, noted Dany’s positive impact on students in everyday interactions, “As callous as a conversation about finances can be, especially when dealing with past due balances, Dany does it with poise and compassion. She listens and provides outstanding services to our students, even among the most difficult situations.
“On the back end, she fosters collaboration and communication with other departments.” She has “...bridged gaps to better streamline processes. She isn’t afraid to have the difficult conversations that no one wants to have, because in the end it would better the process and student experience.”
Dany was recently promoted, and in her new role, she focuses on major processes like enrollment cancellation and mass student refunding. Here she is learning how to process huge volumes of students all at once, in vast contrast to helping students individually in her prior role.
During the virtual ceremony, her management team and coworkers shared many specific examples of the impact she has made. In summary, they shared that “Dany goes the extra mile to help students and her co-workers. She is a team player, and we are proud that she is receiving this recognition.”
Before joining CSULB’s Financial Management team, she worked in the Chancellor’s Office, where she was a Student Assistant for the Accounting Department and CalState TEACH. Dany earned her undergraduate degree in Health Care Management with a minor in Asian studies for CSU Dominguez Hills.
Outside of work, Dany hosts meditation and sound bath events – a meditative practice where participants are encompassed by sounds waves from multiple sources such as singing bowls and rain sticks, etc. – because she believes self-care is one of most important techniques to practice in life. Dany also likes to spend time indulging in television series, traveling to new places, and loves a good cup of coffee.