UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON ARCHIVES
ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM

Interview #1060
McCABE, COLLEEN

McCABE, COLLEEN (1943-)
Undergraduate; academic staff at DoIT (formerly MACC); Secretary of Academic Staff
At UW: [as student] 1962-1966; [as academic staff] 1983-2009

Interviewed: 	2009 (2 sessions)
Interviewer: 	Linda Scholl
Index by: 	Stephen A. Pierce
Length: 	2 hours, 50 minutes

Abstract: In her two September 2009 interviews with Linda Scholl, Colleen McCabe chronicles her lifelong involvement with the University of Wisconsin-Madison, as a faculty kid, undergraduate, employee and campus leader. She reminisced about the university before the Vietnam protest era, when the campus underwent significant changes. She also explained how she returned to work at MACC (now DoIT) and got progressively more involved in issues of academic staff governance. She spoke frankly about the achievements and challenges of this process and offered her thoughts on the status of academic staff at UW by 2009. This interview was conducted for inclusion into the UW-Madison Oral History Program.

Key Words: University of Wisconsin-Madison; Aldo Leopold; UW Arboretum; (ILS) Integrated Liberal Studies; undergraduate life; Vietnam War; political science; National Security Agency (NSA); Hawaii; marriage; Madison Academic Computing Center (MACC), now DoIT Div. of Information Technology; Hayes/Hill titling; academic staff; grievance committee; Administrative Data Processing (ADP); Stephen Myrah;; Madison Academic Staff Association (MASA); retirement; Participatory Learning and Teaching Organization (PLATO); David Musolf; collective bargaining.

First Interview Session (September 1, 2009): Digital File

Time	Keywords
00:00:00	Start of Interview/Interviewer’s Introduction

00:00:14	Question: UW-Madison has been your home forever? Answer: McCabe talked about being born during her father’s graduate study, her mother working in the Chemistry dept. She remembered seeing her former home being torn down to make way for the Computer Science center on N. Orchard St. She shared reminiscences from her childhood—luring escaped monkeys from the Primate Lab, picnics with Aldo Leopold’s family, and playing at the Arboretum.

00:03:57	[no question] When her father was hired as faculty at UW, she recalled, the family moved to University Houses and became friends with many of UW’s later top admin-istrators. She fondly remembered this community and going to UW preschool with children of faculty and important community leaders. In 1954, her family moved to the west side of Madison, where she was enrolled in the newly built Midvale School.

00:07:38	[no question] McCabe discussed going to Midvale School, which was significant walking distance from her home; West HS; and then to UW. She’d expressed interest in Northwestern, but her parents refused to pay her way, so she started at UW in 1962. 

00:09:07	[no question] She remembered pre-Vietnam UW as easy to get into, but with high attrition—“they weeded you out” after a year of probation. She found that ILS was interesting, but much more difficult than she expected—ILS drew top East Coast students who she felt were much better prepared for college—especially since she was also working. So after her freshman year, she dropped out of ILS and took courses that were interesting to her.

00:14:22	[no question] McCabe discussed social life during her sophomore year. On probation, she couldn’t pledge to her sorority, roomed at the new Sellery Hall (which she paid for), and worked many weekends at the University Club. She shared anecdotes about dating, work, and interesting visitors at the Club.

00:18:28	[no question] Continuing to talk about her college years, she recounted her grades improving sufficiently to live in Pi Beta Phi sorority house (at a time when the Greek system was strong). This life made her feel “very glamorous,” and she made some very close friends there. She regretted that during the Vietnam era, the national organization shut Pi Beta Phi house down.

00:21:23	[no question] She talked about getting hired by the NSA out of UW. Being a political science major during the ramp-up to Vietnam, she interviewed with the CIA, NSA and State Dept, was flown to Washington DC, was hired by the NSA, took orientation classes, and was assigned to a year-long intensive Vietnamese program in order to transcribe intelligence coming from Vietnam. She also met her future husband there. 

00:25:08	[no question] McCabe described her language training with the NSA, taught by a team of Vietnamese nationals. She related the difficulties of learning a tonal language and the sometimes-stressful experience transcribing/translating reel-to-reel tapes of encoded N. Vietnamese radio signals.

00:29:04	[no question] She recalled protests going on at the time she was working with the NSA and her husband Jim’s getting drafted (after being promised deferment). He got a “sweet deal” doing computing with the Navy, where he went through training and was assigned to a job in Hawaii. She described his high-level position there and the crazy hippie culture she experienced while working at Liberty House (a department store in Waikiki).

00:34:56	[no question] She talked about renting a house among the surfing community of the North Shore of Hawaii, after which they moved to base housing at Pearl Harbor. There she got a job with Schofield Barracks giving CLEP tests to military personnel, which she quit when she became pregnant with their first son.

00:38:31	[no question] When Jim’s tour in Hawaii was over, she related, she insisted that the family return to WI rather than to Maryland, where the politics were very corrupt. Back in Madison, she attended MATC to get a degree in accounting.

00:40:54	[no question] She recounted how her marriage with Jim ended after he developed a relationship with a colleague. They reconciled temporarily and moved to Denver CO, but she said the marriage was broken and she eventually divorced & returned in 1980. 

00:42:54	[no question] After returning to Madison, she explained, she found a job writing a user manual for Cycom, a database support firm for medical offices. This led her to apply to a technical writing job at the computing center (first MACC then DoIT) on UW’s campus, which she thought would let her be “set for life.” She described these years as enjoyable, having a good job and staff and being able to be involved in the governance process on campus.

00:46:38	[no question] McCabe chronicled her growing involvement in academic staff governance. First she volunteered to be an alternate in the Academic Staff Assembly, then the grievance committee. She and Scholl talked about the development of the ASA, her representation of “districts” by job title, and her eventual service on the Hayes/Hill titling committee and the nominating committee.

00:49:42	Follow up: What kinds of grievances? Answer: She recalled one example in particular of a staff member who disputed poor treatment by her boss, though one could dispute firing or raises. She reviewed the grievance procedure for academic staff, with the appeals committee eventually being formalized later on.

00:52:20	[no question] Continuing to talk about the grievance procedure, she noted that the appeals committee could only recommend in cases, not decide them. She then discussed how the provost had overturned committee recommendations in several successive important cases. She detailed one, the UW Press case, in which the Press was losing money and senior, high-salary staff were laid off and younger employees with different skills hired, against protocol. But when the Press employees took their case to the DA, the court ruled in the Press’ favor.

00:58:10	Follow up: What was the affect on the morale of academic staff? Answer: She wasn’t sure, since the grievance proceedings were confidential. She admitted that grievance cases were complex and thorny (and sporadic), but the provost overturned too many all at once. Follow up: The committee communicated its frustration? Answer: Yes; they met with the provost and felt they’d had a good conversation

01:01:36	[no question] Continuing to talk about grievance cases, she related that in most cases in the last 10 years, the appeals panel has found in favor of UW rather than the staff member, with clear cases favoring staff settling early. Follow up: Why? Answer: She attributed it to better defined rules, policies and rights, with the burden being on the employee to prove their grievance case.

01:04:25	Question: Talk about Hayes/Hill. Answer: She remembered the decision that having one umbrella title “administrative specialist” wasn’t adequate, and the state paid a consulting firm Hayes/Hill to identify different classes of staff. She didn’t think she had much input in this process, though she recalled it was a big deal and created a very complex titling system. 

01:07:45	[no question] She discussed the prefix system of Hayes/Hill. She was made a “[no-prefix] editor” but others were given the “distinguished” title unfairly because they were making high salaries. Thereafter, one strove to attain certain prefixes through regular title reviews. She was fortunate to benefit from this system, but in many places with job ceilings, it could be frustrating.

01:11:50	[no question] The system, she said, allowed Hayes/Hill to move many people into the “classified staff” status, which made them equivalent to a state employee rather than a UW employee. She explained the consequences of this.

01:13:29	End of First Interview Session

Second Interview Session (September 14, 2009): Digital File

Time	Keywords
00:00:00	Start of Interview/Interviewer’s Introduction

00:00:14	Question: What was the relationship between faculty and academic staff? Answer: She thought it was generally good, though at MACC/DoIT there were no faculty, so her interaction with this issues was at the grievance level.

00:02:19	Follow up: So academic and classified staff relationships? Answer: She discussed the difference between MACC, which did academic computer processing, and ADP (Administrative Data Processing) which did payroll, etc. After Hayes/Hill, when ADP and MACC were merged into DoIT, some academic and classified staff could be doing exactly the same job. This led to some work-process issues, though more for managers than for the actual employees.

00:06:39	Question: Talk about the gender equity committee. Answer: Shortly after academic staff got their governance structure, UW System undertook a gender equity study which exposed some inequities that she felt had been fixed “for the moment.” Follow up: How? Answer: For faculty, by salary increases; for academic staff, by retitling.

00:08:45	Question: The nominating committee? Answer: The Academic Staff Assembly has a committee that recruits candidates for standing committees and campus-wide committees. When she was appointed to this committee, she said it was a bit of a “quagmire” with a strong chair butting heads with a strong ASA head, with the nominating committee chair eventually quitting. Once the cadre of early governance advocates moved on, she said, this issue essentially went away.

00:14:03	[no question] She observed that while her early involvement in campus governance was exhilarating, with high-powered personalities taking interest, more recently it had become difficult to get experienced, interested people to serve on the Academic Staff Executive Committee (ASEC).

00:16:10	Question: Other committees? Answer: McCabe discussed committees she’d been on. Follow up: What were the major issues? Answer: She listed “A Vision Shared,” collective bargaining, and layoffs and non-renewals as major issues.

00:19:03	Follow up: Was there resistance on campus to academic staff issues? Answer: From the administration mostly. She remembered John Wiley being the provost and the person who needed to be convinced for ideas to move forward.

00:21:15	Question: How did you become academic staff secretary? Answer: While on ASEC, the secretary was Steve Myrah, who had gotten the job over her application in 1992—at that point, she was relieved she’d not got the job because of what he had to do. But when Myrah retired, she was encouraged to apply, was offered the job, and had to consider very carefully whether she actually wanted to do it. She was grateful that she did because it was a good new opportunity for her.

00:27:43	Follow up: What was the day-to-day? Answer: She attended all ASEC and Assembly meetings, writing and distributing the minutes, prepared agenda, did administrative support for grants and awards, and handled “Roundtable.” She explained the tradition of Roundtable and how the administration of it devolved to her when faculty and the Union no longer wanted to be involved in the planning.

00:32:16	Question: What are other accomplishments? Answer: She felt her biggest accomplish-ment was to move the office into the technological age. She explained that the ramification of this was that work could be done quicker and her assistant’s role (previously doing a lot of typing) diminished drastically. Ironically, while McCabe had advised that a ½ time appt be made, the new secretary had hired a full-time staff.

00:37:14	Question: What was your work with the Assembly and ASEC? Answer: It was not very involved but ongoing. 

00:39:04	Follow up: What were the issues? Answer: She talked about the issue of getting appropriate honorific titling for academic staff who are senior instructors or research personnel. This would allow these staff to write letters of recommendation, etc. But the Faculty Senate refused at first and then later allowed “a crumb” that Research Professors could be approved by a faculty committee. But this was little used.

00:43:39	Follow up: What’s the relationship between ASEC and the Faculty Senate? Answer: By university rule, the Senate has exclusive say over academic affairs on campus and ASEC have a say over issues pertaining to them. In the Faculty Senate, she said, were old-guard conservative faculty who ruled and junior faculty who were tentative about speaking up.

00:46:48	[no question] McCabe noted that occasionally, pressure came from other System campuses to get collective bargaining rights (partly because of resentment of the resources devoted to Madison). She felt that people should be given the right to choose whether they wanted to unionize, though she didn’t think the union system would work at UW. Another issue that had recently gotten attention was sabbaticals.

00:51:23	Question: Talk about serving on search-and-screen committees? Answer: She recalled being asked to staff a search-and-screen several years ago, which had hitherto been staffed by administrative personnel. Progressively, she was asked to staff them by herself. Follow up: How did it work? Answer: She said it required working with large committees to publicize the position, distribute applications, develop an interviewing process, make arrangements for candidates, etc.

00:56:22	[no question] She explained why she enjoyed the extensive work of a search and screen committee, because it kept her busy and allowed her to meet lots of people.

00:58:00	Question: Talk about the shift of the place of academic staff on campus during your years. Answer: She supposed academic staff rights and protections had become in place since she’d arrived, but ASEC members had become weaker as the big issues had been resolved. She discussed the varied roles of ASEC and the other committees.

01:03:47	Question: Have academic staff rights translated into greater respect on campus? Answer: She hoped so, citing the greater commitment by academic staff to come to meetings and do committee work, but the faculty’s refusal to allowed academic staff to hold co-chairs on these committees with 2 exceptions. She also discussed (unsuccessful) efforts by ASEC to get an additional academic staff member on the powerful Athletic Board.

01:09:12	Question: What are other key committees? Answer: Since representation was established, acacemic staff were on all the major committees, each one being structured differently. 

01:11:27	Follow up: How widely do personnel identify as being academic staff? Answer: She thought that one of the best results of representation was the committees on academic staff issues in the colleges, because they had an (elected) voice with the dean. She also reflected on the annual half-day academic staff leadership institute sponsored by MASA, which she thought used a lot of resources to preach to the choir.

01:17:04	Follow up: This is because the hardest issues have been won? Answer: She thought so, though there were always issues to be talked about.

01:18:34	Question: Retirement? Answer: She decided that when she turned 65, she’d worked enough and would retire with full Social Security benefits. This was partly because her job had become fairly routine after 10 years.

01:21:28	Question: You’re still involved? Answer: Yes; she volunteered for the retirement association and PLATO. Follow up: What’s PLATO? Answer: It was a program for seniors sponsored by the Div. of Continuing Studies in which she could choose elements of the program she was interested in.

01:23:39	Question: You’ve really continued your connection with UW. Answer: Yes; she related an anecdote about how secretary of faculty David Musolf continued to work because he needed the intellectual stimulation of being in Madison.

01:25:43	Question: Is participation in academic staff governance less well regarded now? Answer: She thought two issues were: a) that the big issues were only salary and benefits now, which didn’t attract individuals; b) that job demands made it difficult to be involved in governance (without some big issue to interest you).

01:28:45	Question: MASA? Answer: She explained that MASA was formed by the same people who pushed academic staff representation, but after some poor presidents, it became apparent that it was ineffective and she was in favor of disbanding it. But some members felt strongly that MASA could act as an “arms length” advocacy group, and it was kept going. Since then, she’d felt it had done a good job as a social organization for academic staff, directed by some energetic people.

01:33:18	[no question] Continuing to talk about MASA, she detailed how the organizers encouraged academic staff to get together—Thursday get-togethers sponsored by different campus units which eventually became too expensive to continue.

01:36:27	End of Second Interview Session

End of Oral History #1060