| Willie and Vivian Larkin fell in love 34 years ago when they were college students at Tuskegee University. Both were bound for careers in academia that took them far and wide. And yet, they made a solemn vow to each other when they were married to keep each other -- and their family -- first in their lives and then worked hard at it during subsequent professional transitions in their lives. As we talk in Willie's office at UW-Extension where he is the chief of staff of UW-Extension Chancellor David Wilson, it is readily apparent that Willie and Vivian are best friends in addition to being married to each other. It's as if they know what is on each other's minds as we talk about Willie's -- and Vivian's -- transition to Madison from Auburn University in Alabama. Willie gave up a tenured position at Auburn as the state specialist for leadership and organizational development. He worked with the Alabama Cooperative Extension system, which had an office in every county, to enhance economic development in the state and individual leadership development. Wilson and he had crossed paths several times. They were both students at Tuskegee and worked at Auburn for 13 years together. They also had similar backgrounds. They both were from large families who grew up on sharecropper farms. When Wilson came to UW-Extension and needed a chief of staff, Willie jumped at the chance. Willie had been head of the faculty senate for a year at Auburn and it whetted his professional appetite for a position with more challenging administrative responsibilities. But he didn't just come home one afternoon and tell Vivian that he had accepted a job at UW-Extension. "I didn't have veto power over Willie coming here and I wouldn't have wanted to," Vivian said who was on a tenure-track at Auburn where she taught in the Department of Rehabilitation and Special Education, College of Education. "How do you say to your husband for 34 years that you don't support his decision to go somewhere? We moved a significant number of times. So that helped me understand that it was okay that he was ready to look at another job and what that meant for our family. When he said he was looking, I asked him where and he let me know and I gave it some thought. I think other families might be a little different. But I was just open to his direction. His interest was to move to a different administrative level. If that was going to happen at Auburn, okay that was fine. But it wasn't happening quickly. I wanted what was going to make him happy." It is the continuous communication in their marriage that has been key to the Larkins remaining so close after 34 years. While each has had much responsibility on a professional basis, they never let it interfere with who they are. It is something that they have worked on every day. "Every day when we would come home, we would have something to talk about," Willie said. "We'd be talking about our kids. We'd talk about paying bills. We'd talk about our work and just general kinds of things. So we were kind of connected daily." Through that continuous communication, Willie was also cognizant of Vivian's situation as well. It wasn't as if it was his career goals that were top and center and nothing else mattered. "One of the important things with her situation was she was on the cusp of attaining tenure because she was going up this year and if successful -- and I think she had everything in place and would have been -- she would have received tenure in March of next year," Willie said. "However, we thought about that and she ultimately made the decision she would give up her pursuit of tenure and join me up here. Alot of times, one if not both of the parties have to give up something. She worked for many, many years to get into the position to attain tenure, which in higher education that is almost like the Pulitzer Prize. You want that. She made the sacrifice and gave it up. That's love." "The reality is that if you have tenure in one place, especially if it is a preeminent university, you can negotiate tenure at the new place," Willie continued. "It depends on what your field is and how much they really want you. But the other thing is that even if you can't get tenure automatically, you can go up early. That means you can avoid waiting around for six years. It would have been advantageous for her to get tenure. On a humorous note, I found out later that the reason Vivian opted to give up the tenure and come early is that she was tired walking two dogs and picking up after them. She needed help and brought those dogs up here. The first few months, she was saying 'Willie, take the dogs out. Willie, take the dogs out.' She needed help with the dogs and that was the price she had to pay to get help." Vivian had to do her own thinking about what the impact on her life was going to be. Several times during our conversation, she referred to herself as "retired," but it seemed that she was more in a place of taking a breather and figuring out what she is going to do. "It is a big sacrifice," Vivian said about giving up her position at Auburn. "But what is important to me is that our family can bring back some harmony and that was actually missing because we were all over the globe. In conversations on how we were going to proceed as a family and what we were going to be doing, it wasn't a smooth thing because we were in so many places. I had to make the decision of what was important to me. And I think the timing was good too. After I stayed there a year, I looked at it and knew I had everything I needed to go for tenure or I could move to Wisconsin. I talked to my dean. She said 'When you get to Wisconsin -- knowing you are going there because that is where your husband is -- you would have to go for tenure again.' Armed with that information, I made that decision that really in the scheme of things, tenure was not that important to me at Auburn. It wasn't going to do anything for me at Auburn once I moved here." While it appears that the original plan was for Vivian to move to Madison after March 2008, family trumped all and she moved to Madison after 15 months. Next issue: How the Larkins managed the transition to Madison. |
| Willie and Vivian Larkin Professional transition By Jonathan Gramling Part 1 of 2 |
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| Willie Larkin (r) and his wife Vivian took 16 months to transition from Alabama to Madison after Willie accepted the job of chief of staff at UW-Extension. |