UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON ARCHIVES
ORAL HISTORY PROJECT

Interview #626
GUSTAFSON, ALICE

GUSTAFSON, Alice (1956- )
Undergraduate student; House fellow; Law student; Assistant director of housing
At UW: 1974-1978; 1978-1981; 1982-

Interviewed: 2003	
Interviewer: Eric Olmanson
Length: 2 hours, 3 minutes

Early impressions of housing; Experiences as house fellow; Visitation policy; Response of housing to student protests; Decline of in loco parentis; Summer conference program; Administrative structure of housing; Information technology in residences; Relationship between housing and private residence halls.

Interview Session (June 10, 2003): Tapes 1-2

Tape 1/Side 1

00:00:23	Alice Gustafson came to the university as a freshman in August, 1974.  She lived in Elizabeth Waters Hall.  She explains that UW was her second choice; her first choice was a much smaller school.

00:01:42	There were few programs to help incoming freshmen adjust to the UW.  One exception was housing, which provided a significant amount of support to new students.  AG became vice president of Elizabeth Waters Hall Association and made many friends at the residence.

00:03:24	In 1976-77 and 1977-78, AG was a house fellow in Chadbourne Hall.  This experience solidified her sense of the importance of housing, and gave her essential training in handling challenges circumstances.  She gives examples of some issues she faced as a house fellow.

00:06:52	The residence life staff and the dean of students provided training to new house fellows.  AG says that people now have the sense that too many expectations were placed on the young house fellows in the 1970s.  Most house fellows were very committed to their positions.

00:08:42	House fellows went through an intensive week of training.  AG discusses some topics that were covered during this week.  One of a house fellow’s first tasks was to guide his or her freshmen through the complex process of fall registration.

00:10:22	AG describes how she applied and was chosen as a house fellow.

00:13:01	When AG was a house fellow in Chadbourne Hall, men were not allowed to remain in women’s residences past 2 am.  She contrasts the policy in the late 1970s to the relaxed attitude towards cohabitation she sees today.

00:15:40	One house in Elizabeth Waters Hall has limited visitation; the rest of the building has unrestricted visitation.

00:17:16	All of the co-ed residences have unrestricted visitation.  Students were once allowed to have only overnight guests of the same sex; they are now allowed to have overnight guests of the opposite sex, with the permission of their roommate.  Conflicts sometimes arise when students are displaced from their rooms because their roommate’s boyfriend or girlfriend stays over.  AG explains why she is not convinced that the current policy on overnight guests is ideal.

00:21:11	By the time AG arrived in 1974, the principle of in loco parentis had almost completely disappeared.  However, students sometimes want increased regulations and security immediately after an assault takes place.

00:24:32	AG explains that in loco parentis disappeared as a result of societal pressures.  Students had recently won other freedoms, such as the right to vote.  Housing found that its student population began to drop just after it had opened three new halls, because students preferred to live in places in which they had greater freedom.  Housing had to sell several of its new buildings back to the university.

00:28:26	AG gives credit to Newell Smith for recognizing the need to change housing regulations in order for housing to survive the era.  Many other colleges greatly expanded the size of their residence facilities and experienced such low occupancy rates that they then had to institute policies requiring freshmen to live in a residence hall.

00:31:12	End of side.

Tape 1/Side 2

00:32:05	AG continues to discuss how housing responded to the student protests.  Housing did not experience significant difficulties with its student staff because it paid them high wages.  Student workers did not form a union.

00:32:48	In the early 1970s, housing introduced an a la carte system in its cafeterias.  Like other changes that took place at this time, this system was designed to give greater freedom to students.

00:34:27	After AG graduated in May 1978, she began law school.  While in law school, she worked under George Gurda during the summers as a conference assistant.  Gurda searched for assistants with exceptional interpersonal and administrative skills.  AG talks about what she learned when she later took over Gurda’s position.

00:39:28	Housing puts on a conference program in the summer in order to fill up its vacant rooms, raise revenue, and fulfill the university’s outreach function.  It is a challenge for housing to put on a completely different kind of program during the summer.

00:43:16	AG explains the roles of the summer conference assistants.  She recalls working 70 to 80 hours a week. 

00:46:55	The two largest groups that came every summer were bankers.  Together they made up half of the summer conference program’s revenue.  AG lists several other groups that came during the summer.

00:49:55	AG talks about Badger Girls State, a program that stayed at UW for over fifty years.  She speculates on the reasons why the program will not be held at UW in 2003, and discusses the impact of the loss of the program on housing.

00:56:33	Most conference programs have been coming to UW for several decades.  UW was one of the first schools to start a summer conference program.  Now that some traditional programs have stopped coming to UW, housing is working harder for less revenue and fewer programs.

00:59:45	All of the athletic department’s summer programs once came to UW.  Some are now held off campus in private residence halls.

01:01:39	End of side.  End of tape.

Tape 2/Side 1

01:01:49	AG talks about her disappointment about the loss of the athletic programs.

01:04:49	She worked as a conference assistant for two summers, and then spent one summer working as a clerk in a Madison law firm.  While working as a law clerk she missed the stimulating atmosphere of housing.

01:06:41	AG planned to practice law when she graduated in 1981.  The following year, after George Gurda had a heart attack, AG began commuting from Milwaukee to assist him with the summer conference program.  After Gurda retired, AG was appointed to his position.  She initially had no idea how unusual it was for a twenty-five year-old to be an assistant director of housing.

01:11:15	At this time AG intended to become a prosecutor once a longer-term replacement for Gurda was found.

01:14:18	When Norm Sunstad was hired as director, he recognized AG’s abilities and promoted her to replace Larry Halle as assistant director of administration.  She lists some of her mentors in the organization.

01:17:26	AG has no regrets about having spent twenty years working at housing.  She maintains her membership in the state bar association and thinks she might become a prosecutor at some point.

01:18:18	AG talks about the administrative structure of housing.  Newell Smith was at one time director of the Office of Housing, which incorporated off-campus housing.  In the early 1970s, Smith became director of university housing, replacing Larry Halle, who became associate director of housing.  Despite this fact, AG never sensed any tension between Smith and Halle.  Neither of them ever referred to this event.

01:22:07	University housing is now a division of the university.  AG does not know when university apartments were folded into housing.

01:23:31	The interviewer explains that the state audit bureau conducted a survey of university housing in the early 1970s.  Perhaps because of this survey, housing adopted Management By Objectives, which involved developing a mission statement.  Housing now uses Total Quality Improvement as a management model.

01:26:02	When AG began working in housing, the mission statement specified that housing would operate with sound fiscal practices.  An accounting professor designed the mechanism by which housing reports its funding.  AG explains the difficulties of operating housing as a self-supporting organization within a public university funded and regulated by the state.

01:30:33	AG describes the current administrative structure of housing.  Under the director there is an associate director and several assistant directors.  Although organizations typically have an associate director who is responsible for administration, the associate director for housing is instead responsible for food services.  Administration is managed by AG, who is an assistant director.  She lists the areas of responsibility overseen by the other assistant directors.

01:33:03	End of side.

Tape 2/Side 2

01:34:00	AG continues to describe the structure of housing.  Although many people find the structure confusing, it functions well.

01:35:07	Many of the administrators in housing belong to the same generation.  At some point they may all begin to retire.

01:37:47	AG talks about the evolution of the information technology (IT) department.  She recalls using computers based on punch-cards.

01:42:10	Information technology was recently expanded in three ways: the establishment of res-net, which connected all the residence rooms to the university backbone, the replacement of the assignment and billing system, and the introduction of the debit-card system, which allowed students to pay for food using credits rather than cash.

01:46:10	AG does not believe the new technology will pay for itself by increasing the organization’s efficiency.  The demand for the technology is very high.  The number one reason students return to residence halls in their sophomore or junior year is because they want res-net.  It cost $5 million to install res-net originally, but the technology must be completely replaced every three or four years.

01:52:11	University administrators believe that freshmen are more likely to have a good first year if they live in a residence hall.  Because there is not enough space for all freshmen to live in university housing, these administrators believe that housing must work with private residence halls.  AG notes that housing does not necessarily want to share its expertise with private residence halls.

01:56:28	The owners of private residence halls occasionally point out that they agreed to work with the university when the university requested their help in housing all first-year students.  They say the university supports the residence halls in periods when there are housing shortages, but does not support them when there is too much housing and they must compete for students.

01:59:49	There was a period in which the freshman class was enormous, and housing could not accommodate all the new students.  Chancellor Donna Shalala introduced enrollment management, which capped the size of the freshman class at UW-Madison.

02:03:36	End of side.  End of tape.

						END