This letter is from another staff person at Ohio State with over 16 years of experience working at this great university and working at approximately the same salary range as Suzanne Nelson. While it is true that you aren’t going to make a fortune working as clerical staff, I am deeply appreciative for the protection that being a Classified Civil Service employee has afforded me since 1984. Several positions that I accepted over the years have been abolished and I was never let go – I found another position through the green sheet.
While fighting breast cancer several years ago, my tyrannical boss had initiated steps towards dismissal from the university as I “inconvenienced” him with my illness and became totally “incompetent” after insisting on working throughout treatment. Again, faculty and staff assistance and the human resources office helped me with advice, counseling and reassurance, getting me through the worst year of my life.
I cannot tell you how grateful my husband and I are to have had OSU Prime Care pay nearly 100 percent of all the cancer treatment (surgery, chemotherapy, radiation, follow-up doctor appointments, medication, physical therapy, etc.) amounting to approximately $45,000 in 1999 alone and had fantastic treatment at the James Cancer Hospital right here at OSU.
While vacationing in Hawaii in May 2000, I had to be hospitalized for one week with E. coli food poisoning from eating a hamburger at a fast food restaurant. Again, OSU Prime Care picked up the tab at approximately $20,000.
Recently, I transferred back to the department where I started my OSU career; I have a wonderful job, a great boss and am so grateful to be a survivor, in every sense of the word.
If this is a lack of benefits, please tell me where there are better ones? Without them, my husband and I would have lost everything.
Karen F. WeimerOffice AssociateChemistry
