This month we turn our attention away from the dockets, hearings, attorneys, employers, and rooms full of people waiting to have their cases heard. Today we look at the people who start it all, the support staff, for without support staff how would people know where to go or when to show up? Let's take a trip to the Cape Girardeau Office and visit with their Docket Clerk.

If you have questions about docket settings in the Cape Girardeau workers' compensation office, talk to Alice.

Alice Ann Schweer has served as the docket clerk for the Cape office for the past twelve years. She started as a receptionist in that office on January 13, 1992. After Janice Crow married and left she became the docket clerk 1 1/2 years later; however, that title does not begin to describe the depth and breadth of her duties. Alice sat down to explain the inside story about setting a case in Cape and to offer suggestions and humor (little humor) along the way.

"I didn't know anything about workers' compensation when I started here," recalls Alice. "Now I look at employees from a different perspective. Many employees do not seem to understand the workers' compensation process," observes Alice. So part of her job is educating them about the process.

Although she may not have known much about workers' compensation when she started with the division, she was no stranger to getting the job done. A 20-year employee at Procter & Gamble before her employment with the state, Alice was a self-named "Module Start Up Secretary."

She was responsible for administrative set up for new converting modules within the Cape Girardeau plant. This involved the initial creation of all office systems for each newly formed module to include all operating forms, manuals, mail systems, etc. Her strong typing skills made this a smooth process and also resulted in her being chosen in the late 70s as one of three plant clerks to test the first word processing system ever used by Procter and Gamble.

During her 20 years with the company she held seven positions, five of those being a module start-up secretary for Industrial Relations, Pampers Module B, Rely, Luvs, and Always. She has the distinct honor of starting up more modules than any secretary in the plant's history. In fact, after accepting the secretarial position for another new module being built, other secretaries began to suggest that she give someone else a chance!

Alice attributes her module start-up success to her strong organizational skills. After declining my offer to demonstrate these skills in my home, she explained how these skills enable her to perform as a Docket Clerk.

The Cape office sets cases on a request basis each month. For example, at the end of April Alice will compile a list of requests by type of setting, venue and judge and submit it to Chief Judge Jack Knowlan. Using the list, Judge Knowlan decides the number of docket days for June by type of setting, venue and judge. Alice will then set the cases for June, which average about 800 each month. The Cape office is currently responsible for twenty-two counties.

In addition to setting dockets, Alice is also responsible for tracking awards for each judge on a monthly basis; this data is then included in the month-end reports. Processing the completed dockets and other duties are shared with co-worker Jan Shultz.

Chief Judge Knowlan had this to say: “Alice is a working machine. Whatever it takes to get her job done she does it. She does the work of one and a half to two people. She and Jan Schultz are both indispensable to our office. We could not get the work done without them. Both are great workers and that makes my job easy. Alice stays later than the attorneys sometime, until 5:30 or 6:00 pm, getting work done and she does a fantastic job”.

For practicing attorneys, she suggests that you familiarize yourself with the local docket rules for Cape settings. Settings require specific forms, she explains. For instance, pre-hearings in represented cases are called mediations in Cape. Using the proper form will prevent delay in having the request returned to the sender. When in doubt, ask.

After a busy day at the division, Alice still finds time to enjoy many activities. For example, she likes to read novels by British authors. Jane Austen is one of her favorites as her writings are what she describes as old fashioned, prim and proper. She also enjoys some science fiction. Favorites are Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien and Chronicles of Narnia (consisting of seven books in a series) by C. S. Lewis. The excitement rises in her voice as she explains that Tolkien and Lewis were friends and that Tolkien led Lewis to Christ.

A woman of faith, Alice has read the entire Bible many times. She is also a pianist and organist and served as church organist for approximately ten years.

Photography is another enjoyable pastime for Alice. She is also an avid bird lover, having three tropical birds, along with her fox terrier, Rusty.

She calls herself a recently converted computer nerd, keeping up with the latest editions of XP Magazine. This interest developed after she bought a computer last August.
 

Alice has traveled extensively. She shared the photo in this article, which was taken during her trip to Karnak Temple in Egypt in 1985. She saw the temple in a couple of movies (i.e., Agatha Christie's Death on the Nile and a James Bond movie, The Spy Who Loved Me) and she became hooked on archaeology.

"As a child growing up on a farm in southeast Missouri, I used to sit up in the hay loft and look out the loft opening," she recalls, "and dream of seeing the world and I did!"

"Traveling to the various countries in Europe and the Middle East made the Bible become more alive because I got to go to many of the places I had been reading about. It was an awesome experience."

Although you may not describe your next visit to the Cape office as awesome, Alice can certainly help you to make it productive.