February 28, 2007: Special Edition

The Newsletter of UF Computing & Networking Services  

SPECIAL EDITION CNS Bids Farewell to Retiring Associate Director Marie Dence

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Marie & /Update: The Early Years

When Dence started at CNS, there was no e-mail, computers were not on every desktop and UF had 25,019 students enrolled. Three decades have shaped what we know of computing today and Dence, retiring from her post as an associate director of the data center, has been a catalyst for many of those changes.

At CNS, she initiated our first online documentation system (DOCSYS) and helped to formalize a computer training program to serve UF. She was instrumental in bringing Gartner Group and NETg training to campus. She also participated in developing campus-wide training programs for administrative (DANCE, DAta Network Computer Education) and technical staff (the UF IT Certification/Computer Challenge and Peer2Peer).

The biggest changes, Dence said, have been in computing technology, publishing technology, and CNS itself. "When I started, only computer programmers and researchers used computers. Now they are used by almost everyone to do daily work," she said. The availability of computers has also changed. "People didn't have workstations on their desks like we do now. Computers and terminals were a shared commodity at best," she said. Publishing has also drastically changed in those 30 years. "When I first started, I was the whole publications staff. At that time, I started /Update (the monthly newsletter for CNS) and the Guidebook for New Users, developed a 20-volume set of user manuals for CNS systems and services, and re-organized the Memo system, ancestor of today's CNS NEWS," Dence said.

"I typed our first /Update on a typewriter. The first manuals used punch cards to generate the text," she said.

She was also one of the earliest and most active advocates of software copyright compliance at UF. As chair of the Copyright Work Group of CITSADM, she was instrumental in bringing speakers to promote awareness of copyright issues, and developing the UF Software Copyright Policies and Guidelines, in addition to many of the training materials still in use at the university.

Her recent projects at CNS include coordinating training, documentation, consulting, CNS user groups, and serving on the CNS budget committee.

She was a member of the first UF IT Task Force, chair of the Council for Information Technology Administrative Services (CITSADM), chair of the UF Technical Training workgroup, and was (until her retirment) a member of the UF IT Training Committee.

Statewide she has served as President of FAEDS (the Florida Association of Educational Data Systems), been an active participant in FETC (the Florida Education Technology Conference), and has served as a member of the Editorial Board of the Florida Technology in Education Quarterly. She helped to develop the original proposals for statewide services which eventually became Florida Center for Library Automation (FCLA) and Florida Information Resource Network (FIRN).

"Most of all," she said, "I have been fortunate to work with many incredibly talented people who are really good at what they do, which has made it easier for me to do what I have needed to do."

As the ever-present "human-perspective" voice at the data center, Dence was the champion of the User; always striving to make sure the things we do are useful to -- and usable by -- human beings. Her guidance will be sorely missed.

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/Update issues prior to November 2004 are available as Adobe Acrobat Portable Document Format (PDF) via the "Back Issues:" drop-down, above.

Selected articles may also be found in html and PDF format in DOCWEB.