Facilities Ops Crew - The Ones That Make It Happen

Our Teams

This semester's ethnographic research has been transformative in ways we didn't anticipate when we first began shadowing the behind-the-scenes operations of Duke Athletics. What began as an academic exercise in observation became something far more meaningful: an education in how institutions actually function beneath their polished surfaces.

The most noticeable shift in our understanding came through recognizing that facilities work is fundamentally relational rather than just technical. We entered this project expecting to see lots of administrative work, maintenance schedules, and logistics; ultimately, what we thought it takes to keep Duke's 27 varsity sports operational. Instead, we discovered that the work of sustaining athletic infrastructure depends less on technical skill alone than on the relationships and institutional knowledge accumulated over years of presence across campus. When coaches stop to ask about family members, when sports doctors extend informal care, when construction workers paused their work to chat, these moments reveal the true infrastructure sustaining Duke Athletics.

Recording audio and video fundamentally changed how we understand ethnographic documentation. Written fieldnotes, however detailed, cannot capture the soundscape of daily labor. These recordings hold embodied truths that our jottings miss entirely. These sensory dimensions constitute the work as much as any task list.

Destiney and Karey’s final visit to the softball and field hockey areas on East Campus solidified themes that had been building throughout our fieldwork. Watching ground crew members spread clay to absorb rainwater while chatting through a slow, rainy day, we understood that even maintenance work operates through relationships. 

What surprised us most was how personal the goodbye felt. Somewhere between loading equipment into pickup trucks and touring hidden sanitation sites, between learning about NIL regulations and hearing about staff transitions, we had been welcomed into a world most students never see. Doors were opened literally and figuratively, and we were trusted with the complexities and contradictions of facilities work. That trust feels like both a gift and a responsibility as we build our website.

We leave this fieldwork with questions that exceed what any single project could answer. How do newer employees without established networks navigate these systems? What happens to operational efficiency when key relationship-holders retire or leave? How much of Duke's functioning depends on invisible labor and informal networks that no organizational chart captures? These questions matter beyond athletics, pointing toward how all institutions rely on relational work that goes unrecognized and uncompensated. Most importantly, this experience taught us that ethnography isn't just about collecting data. It's about building relationships with people who trust you enough to show you the truth behind institutional facades. We were shown that truth generously, and we're grateful for everything it revealed about labor, care, and the human work of keeping places running.