Opportunities available to support Protect Purdue through talent sharing program

The Purdue Together: Talent Sharing Program is still in need of Boilermakers to lend time and talent to other areas on campus, including areas with urgent needs that support the Protect Purdue Plan.

Purdue’s COVID-19 Information Center is still in need of call center supervisors and agents to answer questions and supply information to callers about the University impact and functions around COVID-19. The weekly commitment is only six to nine hours.

Also, the University’s Protect Purdue Health Center is in need of contact tracers and testing attendants to help make convenient on-site COVID-19 testing available to faculty, staff and students.

The COVID-19 testing attendant’s duties include asking screening questions, completing registration procedures and providing self-testing kits for all individuals arriving for COVID-19 testing. This testing will be solely self-testing, whereas the patient/individual being tested will either swab themselves or provide a saliva sample. 

The contact tracers will search for those who have tested positive for COVID-19, via web or phone, and then contact everyone who has been near them and encourage them to self-isolate at home. The contact tracers will use a web-based client resource management platform to contact all connections of anyone diagnosed with COVID-19. These individuals will record symptoms, refer the patient for the appropriate next steps, which could include testing, and give directions for quarantine.

Employees participating in the Talent Sharing Program will continue to be compensated at their normal rate.

Participation in the Talent Sharing Program is clearly helpful for departments in need, but the benefits aren’t one-sided.

“Utilizing the Talent Sharing Program has allowed the Disability Resource Center to support others on campus in a different way and additionally has been mutually beneficial for our office,” said Mandie Waling, assistant director in the Disability Resource Center. “The specific program our DRC access facilitator has engaged with, Education Technology, has provided us with more insight into how the new Learning Management System will function and the accessibility features that need to be utilized by our office to support students within Brightspace.”

Beyond the COVID-19-specific needs detailed above, many additional opportunities for talent sharing are available at the Purdue Together: Talent Sharing site.