After nearly 35 years of service in several different university positions, the former associate provost for academic administration retired this month.

Susan Logue has contributed to the university and area through such ventures as Morris Library’s remodeling and preventing a financial disaster for SIU’s Touch of Nature Environmental Center, she said.

“It’s hard to identify one favorite memory,” she said. “I’ve had a lot of opportunities to make a positive difference at SIU.”

Logue said she began her SIU career in 1975 as a Morris Library student assistant for two years until she took a position as a civil service employee for two more. She said she left the university in 1979 to take an internship and later worked for a Carbondale law firm for three years because the university was not hiring.

She said she eventually took a job in civil services again in 1983 for 12 years until she was hired as a Morris Library faculty member. In her time at the library, Logue said, she served as a digital imaging librarian, director of instructional support services and associate dean for support services.

Logue said she was also appointed as an acting professor for academic administration and the associate dean of library affairs in her time at SIU.

She said she took on the Touch of Nature Center administration when she became responsible for the Division of Continuing Education in her last four years as the associate provost for academic administration.

“I moved Touch of Nature out from under Continuing Education and had it reporting directly to me,” Logue said. “This allowed me to work directly with the staff and help turn around the deficit spending trend that had been going on for many years.”

She said she first worked with Touch of Nature in 1979 as the Camp Little Giant beach director and found the experience rewarding.

Logue said she also enjoyed the opportunity to work on the Morris Library renovation project and her work as associate provost in 2007, even though it was a challenge. She said she took on the Morris Library project on the condition that she could do what she thought was best for the library.

“The decisions were not always the most popular, but I was able to maintain a clear conscience in all of my work,” she said.

Some library staff members said they thought Logue was a good leader.

Susan Tulis, associate dean of library affairs, said Logue was instrumental in working with the university’s physical plant and others involved in library renovations.

Tulis said Logue was one of the longest working staff members through her many positions at the library, and she was very proud of what she did.

“I don’t think anybody would disagree with the statement that she contributed a lot to this library and made it what it was today,” Tulis said.

David Schremp, procedures and systems analyst for the library, said he enjoyed working with Logue.

“Susan was a very organized person,” he said. “She was very driven. She had her way of doing things. I think she was a get-it-done type of manager. She wanted to make sure projects kept moving.”

Schremp said Logue would set goals for him and other workers to meet. He said she would meet with individuals and provide them with tools if they lacked the resources.

“I thought she was very fair,” he said. “Whether anyone liked her or loved her or not, the fact is she did a good job.”

Logue said she retired from the university to pursue other goals.

“I decided to retire because I wanted to move on to different things in my life,” she said. “I’ve worked there almost constantly since I was 17 years old and wanted to spend more time with my family and getting reacquainted with my hobbies and personal pursuits.”