Dee Willems ’90, MS’96

UW Archives S06352

“I figured if it was going to happen eventually, it might as well be me,” says Dee Willems ’90, MS’96, who became the UW Marching Band’s first woman drum major in 1989. (See Tradition for more on the band’s audition process.) Today, Willems teaches middle-school Spanish in Wisconsin Rapids, and is grateful for the on-field skills she gained that remain relevant in the classroom: how to work with a wide variety of personalities and “how to [use] a commanding voice … to get a roomful of people’s attention when they’re misbehaving.”