Associate CIO Cathleen Middleton to Retire on Sept. 8

Photo by University Relations

Associate CIO Cathleen Middleton will retire on Sept. 8.

Cathleen Middleton, associate chief information officer, has announced her retirement effective Sept. 8, after serving for 36 years at the University of Arkansas in various roles in IT Services. A drop-in retirement reception for Middleton will be held from 2 to 4 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 8, in ADSB 240. Cake and punch will be served.

Middleton earned a Bachelor of Science from the University of Arkansas in computer science in December of 1978 as a member of one of the first classes to graduate in the new major. She changed her major from math to industrial engineering and then to computer science because she thought it could prepare her for a career with NASA.

"Computer science was new and exciting," Middleton said, "and the space program was fascinating stuff at that time."

Her first job with what was then called U of A Computing Services was as a student machine room operator working on a mainframe IBM System/370 Model 155, a computer system with 2MB of memory that filled a room. The system ran programs by compiling information from punch cards, and Middleton's duties were to pick up card decks from faculty and students waiting to run programs, load them, and run the jobs.

"I got the job after noticing that some other students in the computer science courses seemed to have an edge. When I asked them about it, it turned out they were working at Computing Services," Middleton said. "It was a job where I got to meet people and develop the edge that those other students had."

That edge took her just about as far as a technologist can go at the University of Arkansas — eventually all the way to an associate CIO position.

After graduation, Middleton was hired as an application programmer working on the conversion of the UA student records system from a flat file structure to a relational database system. One of the challenges of the project was a limit of 2KB per program.

"We learned how to break up logical processes into small units and then call multiple smaller units in a defined sequence to make a grade change or update a student financial record," Middleton explained.

Middleton's IT career evolved from there, working in various roles from being the administrative data manager to leading a team that provided microcomputer support only a few years after the IBM PC was introduced, to managing the Java development team, and eventually to becoming the database administration team manager in 2002. At one point her team wrote programs for the new desktop computers that tracked the training of social workers in the state and allowed the University of Arkansas Foundation to write checks from a desktop.

"When the IBM PC was introduced in 1981, the computer field started to change dramatically," Middleton said, "and I was a charter member of a group programming systems for these new individual desktop computers. Then in 2000, the network really changed everything!"

Middleton taught herself IBM's first commercial relational database management system, the forerunner of DB2, which led to Paul Cronan, professor in the Walton College of Business, asking Middleton to present the new database to his class. Middleton then put her new skills to work managing the team that would support the foundation of ISIS, and took courses to become an IBM Certified Specialist-DB2 UDB and a Solutions Expert-DB2 UDB.

"We were gearing up for enterprise level database management," Middleton said, "with more robust backups, rollbacks and performance tuning. There were a lot more knobs to turn."

In 2007, Middleton was asked to accept the leadership position for Technical Services and Operations in IT Services, a group of over 25 technical experts providing support for a great deal of the infrastructure that runs everything on campus from payroll to course registration and grades, to email and any system that requires a UARK username and password.

"I didn't question whether or not I could do the job. I knew the people and the team, and that's what made the job something I could enjoy," Middleton said. "No one person can know all these systems. What I did was depend on the team."

Recently Mike Adair, senior mainframe systems programmer, asked Middleton, "How does it feel to know that two men are taking over one woman's job?" referring to the new CIO Chris McCoy's decision to divide her teams into two groups that will be managed in the interim by David Bruce and Don Faulkner.

"I know both of my replacements will do an excellent job," Middleton said, "but I do hope that more women become involved in computer science because it's an interesting field. Women can do anything they put their mind to. There are no obstacles unless you make them an obstacle."

Technology changed dramatically over Middleton's 36 years with IT Services. Smart phones now have more computing power than the IBM System/370 where she loaded punch cards in her first job. Middleton has, indeed, been able to do what she put her mind to, and her career changed as the technology changed.

"Looking back, I realize what a pleasure it's been to be a part of such an organization, to meet the challenge of keeping up with the demands of technology, and to watch the university grow and see it in such a position of strength," Middleton said.