Victoria Pendzick, right, is this year’s recipient of the Member Award for Excellence in FA Service. She was nominated by Cynthia Eaton and poses with FA President Dante Morelli. (photo by Joan Wozniak)

For the past 17 years, Victoria Pendzick has been incredibly generous to the FA with her time and talents—she speaks about her love of the FA in this faculty profile—which is why I nominated her for this year’s Member Excellence Award for Service to the FA.

Most people at the college know Victoria as a specialist II in media services or as one of the college photographers. Victoria’s the one we see capturing students’ joy during Commencement and other graduation ceremonies, during SCC Foundation events and all manner of institutional activities. What many do not realize is just how much time and talent Victoria has devoted to the FA.

Victoria is a magician

If you have ever taken up photography as a hobby, you know that Victoria makes it look easy. It is not. We have hosted FA events in all manner of settings, and she knows better than anyone that auto settings mean nothing without a skilled photographer holding that camera. Victoria always manages to capture us looking crisp and professional and presents us in our best light. We have had Victoria take our officers and leaders headshots for a while now, and she’s endlessly welcoming, whether in her studio at Grant or doing outside shots in a more natural setting. In spring 2026, she generously donated her time to redoing all of our headshots as well as a group photo. Since we have a new grievance officer, John Capurso, we need members to know so they don’t continue to contact our outgoing grievance officer, Kevin McCoy; Victoria’s new set of headshots as well as our new team photo definitely helped with this.

Victoria is patient and kind and offers numerous suggestions, posing us and fixing our stances or our hair when she realizes it will not look just right in the photograph. Victoria knows how to bring out everyone’s best selves and their best smiles. I don’t know many people who love to have their photos taken or to see themselves in photos, but Victoria makes the entire process so much less painful with her skills and talent. Okay, her training at Pratt Institute surely played a role but you won’t convince me that she doesn’t also possess some kind of magic.

Unofficial documentarian of the FA

Victoria has also served as de facto documentarian of FA events for the past 17 years. Throughout this time, Victoria has been so reliable. Of course we know it is Victoria’s job to be at all of the college events and activities and to take, edit and upload all of those photographs. It is not her job to do all of these FA events on top of that, especially since a good number of them happen outside of her regular work hours.

Victoria has covered events as varied as promotion workshops, new member meetings and social events, our annual holiday party/Spring Fling, adjunct orientations, Making Strides Against Breast Cancer walks and more. Some of these are after work and on Saturday mornings. She is under no obligation to attend these as our photographer, but she believes in the FA and has been so generous with her time and talent.

In addition, as editor of The WORD, I could not have gotten along with the images to publish three issues a semester, year after year, for the past decade and a half without Victoria’s contributions, not to mention her patience with my numerous last-minute, frantic “hey, do you have a photo of _____?!” messages to her, which the magician always seems to have and gets to me in time.

More than pretty pictures

Victoria has provided service to the FA in other ways as well. She has served as one of our more active FA mentors practically since she was hired, offering constant guidance and friendly, collegial support to a number of newly hired colleagues as they learned the ropes and helping them become acclimated to the college.

Victoria has also been a College Personnel Committee rep for years, which is one of those invaluable but behind-the-scenes and thankless tasks that mean the world to colleagues up for promotion. She was an active and involved member of Kevin McCoy’s health and safety committee that was so sorely needed throughout the pandemic, and Victoria’s knowledge (because of her role as college photographer) was particularly helpful since she knows pretty much every nook and cranny of this institution.

After she earned her master’s degree at LIU, Victoria began teaching classes like the History of Photography, and I know students who have been in Victoria’s classes. Her devotion to her students also merits kudos.

So many of our PA and specialist members do work that is more behind the scenes, just like Victoria is invariably behind the camera. It is important to show our deep appreciation when we see that they are so dedicated to representing our institution, running around constantly, day in and day out, not shirking their responsibilities but meeting and exceeding them with a cheerful pride in their labor. This is especially true for members who are parents of young children! It is not easy managing all we do on campus while maintaining a work-life balance.

Victoria does that every day as the college photographer and she does that each and every time we ask her to share her skills as our FA photographer. Please join me in giving Victoria your congratulations and help bring a smile to her face.