John Ooley
Custodian
Regional Academic Health Center
John Ooley came to IU to support his family and found joy in supporting the IU Bloomington family as well. John has been a custodian at IU since 1999, working at several IU buildings before coming to the Regional Academic Health Center.
He has formed lasting connections with students and faculty, and one of his favorite parts of his work is admiring the accomplishments and evolution of the student body through generations.
In 2015, John earned a Staff Merit Award for his dedication to keeping campus looking sharp and sparking cheer in colleagues and students.
Q: Where are you from, and what led you here to IU? How long have you worked here?
A: I’m from Ellettsville, Indiana. I worked in construction for private and local contractors for around 14 years. I wanted to provide for my kids, but the jobs I did had no benefits or insurance. It was tough to find work in the wintertime with the cold or rain, so I was frequently laid off and had to find other means, such as working on weekends. And when my wife and I got married, I was supposed to have a week of vacation for our honeymoon, but I had only about two days off before my bosses asked me to come back in and work.
So, I ended up interviewing at IU Health Bloomington Hospital and at IU. At my interview for the hospital, they said they would be in touch with me, but at IU, they said, “We want to hire you today.” I believe that whoever calls me is where I’m supposed to go, so I came to IU! I’ve been here 24 years now, and it’s been a great place to work that’s also provided for my family, including six grandkids.
Q: What do you like most about your job?
A: I like to interact with students and faculty here. When you get a routine down with people, you can get to know them and get on a personal level. We all go through our moments in life, whether it’s an illness or a death, and it’s good to be able to have community. It’s been a big experience in my life, and it’s a way I can give personally to the university, as well as a way to see students who come to the building. They’re here for a couple of years before they go off, and I always wonder how they all are and hope they stay in touch with me. Sometimes they’ll come back and say, “Hey John! How’re you doing!” I really enjoy seeing the students grow up and seeing them succeed.
Q: What do your interactions with students mean to you?
A: Through my work at the Health Center, I like to see the generations that come into IU. They’re getting opportunities that I didn't have when I was young, since my parents didn’t have a lot of money. I like to see the younger generation and what’s going to be ahead. I love to see them excel and go on in life, and I always look for if there’s any way I can help them out. They’ll come to me, and I like letting them know that whatever it is, they’ll get through it. We all have things in life we have to get through, and a positive attitude is important if you can have it.
Q: You won the Staff Merit Award in 2015 for your outstanding service. What kind of work were you doing at the time?
A: I worked at the Eskenazi Museum of Art at that time, and I was a day custodian there. I mainly swept the galleries and did office work, like collecting trash and tidying up. I had other areas to cover as well, like Radio-TV and Theater and Drama. I also had a daycare where I had about eight or nine areas to cover. I had a partner that did the Lily, and when he was off on vacation or another circumstance, I’d cover his areas, too. It was quite a bit to cover back in the day!
Often, I’d get a radio call to go fix a paper towel dispenser or something and take off. At the museum, I would have to get my badge and security because I covered areas that had a lot of valuable artworks. You must be careful when you work around them. Then, I was told it was going to be renovated, so my boss told me there was a building they needed me to go to, which was the Department of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences by the Simon Music Center. I worked in that department for a good bit, and it was exciting to go to a new building.
Q: What's a day in the life look like for those who might not know what all you do?
A: I do a lot of recycling, and I clean and wipe down tables and stock up the restrooms. On Mondays and Wednesdays, I clean up the preschool and the playground through the daytime, since they have a morning class and a gap before the afternoon class. I also get prepped for the evening class, and once that’s over, the evening crew comes for their shift.
There will always be things that come up, like a spill or broken glass, and I’ll get a call or text to come check it out. I like to clean the entryways when I see things like mud being tracked in. It’s basically impossible to cover the entire area, but I try to limit it to a minimum to keep the building presentable, clean, and disinfected. When people host events, I help move tables and chairs and store them in another area so that they can have their graduations or ceremonies. I also go around and dust to get things that the night crew may have missed, since you see more in the daylight.
