Sherifa Abdalla

About

Sherifa Abdalla is a highly motivated leader with 14+ years of professional work experience in higher education administration. She recently joined Cornell University and currently serves as Financial Specialist II in the Department of Global Development. 

Ms. Abdalla began her career in 2007 as one of the nine (9) President’s staff members at NJCU’s Office of the President: University Legal Counsel and Equal Employment Opportunity/Affirmative Action (EEO/AA) to ensure the implementation of University policies and initiatives and provided timely advice and assistance to the President and University Administration in legal matters; as well as, other matters as directed by the President and Board of Trustees. Ms. Abdalla has knowledge of matters involving State and University conflicts of interest standards; State Anti-Discrimination standards; Open Public Records Act (OPRA); MOUs, agreements, Title IX, H-1B litigation, and personnel and confidential files.

In January 2014, she served as the Assistant to the AVP for Information Technology and was also appointed to serves as grant manager and member of the University’s Grants Review Committee for the Higher Education Technology Infrastructure Fund (HETIF) worth $1.5 million and the Higher Education Equipment Leasing Fund (HELF) worth $1.7 million.  She also managed the IT department’s $5 million capital and operating (salary and non-salary) budget which ranks second largest budget in the University. Additionally, she was responsible for negotiating, procuring, and maintaining all University software and hardware contracts and licenses worth $1.7 million; as well as, e-procurement (e-Pro, GSA, sole source contracts, etc.).  As IT office manager, Ms. Abdalla assisted, enforced and monitored departmental procedures and guidelines; developed and managed IT-related polices and reports (i.e., Fiscal Year Plan – Trends; Yearly Accomplishment Reports; IT Strategic Plans (5-Year); IT Security Incident Investigation and Reports; Security Audit Reports & Responses; as well as, Middle States Reports & Responses).

In September 2016 she worked in the Controller’s Office – Bursar that supports the University educational goals and was responsible to safeguard cash, manage university accounts and transactions in accordance with University cash handling policies.  She was instrumental in identifying and alerting flaws and potential flaws and assisted with implementing new security measures and safeguards in the Bursar’s Office.   

In October 2017, Ms. Abdalla returned to the Office of the Provost and Senior Vice President where she worked collaboratively as a problem-solving team with purpose to support the University’s President and ensure the implementation of University policies and initiatives.

In March 2019, she served as DHS-approved Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVIS) Designated School Officer (DSO) and Alternate Responsible Officer (ARO) for NJCU’s Office of Global Initiatives and International Programs at NJCU and her role expanded to Coordinator of the American English Program (AEP). 

Aside from professional work experience, Ms. Abdalla holds three (3) Master’s degrees and has an educational background in Business Administration, Finance, Accounting, National Security and Cyber Security/Information Assurance. She also earned two (2) National Security Agency (NSA) Certificates in Cyber Security: Information Systems Security Professionals (INFOSEC), NSTISSI No. 4011 and Information Systems Security Officers (ISSO) - Standard 4014 (Entry). Ms. Abdalla also has advanced level certification by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA)/Tax Counselling for the Elderly (TCE). She is currently a member of the National Language Services Corps (NLSC) that contributes to using language for the good of all and is sponsored to take the Defense Language Proficiency Exam (DPLT) in foreign languages she has proficiency. She is proficient in Arabic and was placed in Intermediate Chinese.

Ms. Abdalla supports humanitarian and community outreach efforts both local and overseas. In 2005, she began volunteering with the Domestic Violence Victim Response Team (DVVRT) at the Hoboken Police Prescient which involved serving on-call shift basis each month.  Ms. Abdalla counselled victims of domestic violence; empowered victims to seek help and leave their batterer(s) by offering such options as restraining orders, shelters, hotlines, and other agencies for further assistance.

Ms. Abdalla presently volunteers as an Emergency Medical Responder (EMR) Community Based Emergency Caregiver (CBEC). She became highly trained and completed over 60 hours of medical training, 6 hours of Basic Life Support (BLS), 6 hours of Advanced Life Support (ALS) and 4 hours at HUDCEN EMS dispatch units. Her volunteer role quickly evolved into District Manager for the community-based emergency care initiative that responds to health emergencies throughout Jersey City.  Ms. Abdalla was asked to serve as an independent contractor/consultant by United Rescue USA and United Hatzalah Israel for temporary assignment in creating and implementing an emergency strategic plan to immediately improve call volumes and promote volunteerism and CBEC engagement.   Her success of this assignment was pivotal to the continued success of the program and in order to secure funding from donors and stakeholders we needed to show evidence of CBEC engagement.

Ms. Abdalla values lifelong learning; professional growth and development; continuing education; and has a strong willingness and moral value to be a contributing member, to share her knowledge and skills, and to give back and volunteer her services to better our world. Her goal is to uphold the highest degree of professionalism, competency and integrity.  She aspires to be a leader and/or contributor and to make positive contributions.