Janice Watkins Award Winners 1992 Article

A job isn't just a paycheck to staff award winners by Laurent Pernot

Long before President Bill Clinton challenged Americans to “a season of service” during his inaugural speech, Lucille Harris and Renee Pleshar had decided to help people in any way they could, both at UIC and in their communities.

For demonstrating what Pleshar calls a readiness to go out of one's way," the two women were honored with the 1992 Janice Watkins Award for Distinguished Civil

Service from the Support Staff Advisory Council. They were honored at a luncheon on campus Monday.

The award is given yearly to up to three members of the support staff who show great dedication to their work, as well as people.

It is named for Janice Watkins, a supervisor in the insurance office and past president of the support staff group, who was killed by an automobile on her way home from work in 1974.

Harris and Pleshar both started working at UIC in 1978 and quickly became involved in the campus community.

“Don’t come to work thinking you’re just here to get check,” Harris said, “Bring something with you.”

After working in the Center for Educational Development, the College of Nursing and the office of Student Services, Harris became administrative secretary in the Department of Oral Anatomy in 1987.

“When I started here, people were not getting along and I saw the need for a different type of spiritual communication,” said Harris, a Chicago native.

“A few others and I tried to become a vehicle for communication.”

They established a support staff group. Harris, who is active in her church, helped organize the office’s first holiday parties and a Bible study group attended by staff, students and faculty.

“People try hard, but sometimes they can’t help but bring their problems to work or to class,” she said. “We can work together and love. It’s important to get a hug or a warm handshake.

“UIC doesn’t have to be heartless, and it isn’t when we really try to make a difference.”

Pleshar started working in the Department of Biological Sciences “on a temporary basis” after completing a bachelor’s degree in elementary education at UIC. She’s now the department’s administrative aide.

“I’m honored to have received the award. Helping others is like a second nature,” she said. “I’ve always felt the need to get involved.”

Active in church activities and food drives, she volunteers for a domestic violence hotline.

“I provide support to the faculty with research, teaching and administrative tasks and I work very closely with my staff,” she said.

“But I feel it’s also very important to provide personal support when it’s needed.”

She said her job includes helping others through difficult emotional times and being “willing to go the extra mile” - such as the time a faculty member called her at home on the Southwest Side at 8 p.m. to ask her to deliver a grant request from UIC to O’Hare Airport within two hours.

Both women are not only helping to fulfill the educational mission of the university, they’re back in school themselves.

“My long-term goal is to be in the service profession,” said Pleshar, who is working on a master’s degree in social work at UIC.

“I want to work with women and children.”

Harris is studying for a bachelor’s degree in sociology from Chicago State University.

“Classes at UIC are not always available in the evening, so I go to class there after work,” she said.

“I want to help invest in the city’s children.”

Harris is president of her neighborhood association, the Michigan and State 101st block club.

She has enrolled neighborhood youth in a beautification program and works closely with community members and leaders.

“The neighborhoods have been abandoned and some needs have to be addressed,” she said.

“I have the desire to work at the grassroots level to help address them.”