In my department, the younger, more junior professors seem comfortable going back to in person. But some of the senior population is much more unwilling.
I have not experienced any pressure yet to go in person, but I know the university wants there to be a continuum of in-person, hybrid, and online classes available in all majors. I’m not sure what they’ll do if they find out that instructors’ preferences are overwhelmingly for online.
Also, this is a good read:
I really don’t know how I feel about all of this. I teach band, and my wife teaches HS English. My HS band is 110 kids currently. Well over the “large group” size recommendations. I really don’t know how we are going back in the fall. But, our district is committed to going back “as normal” right now. Sigh.
So many things to think about, that I’m not sure they have. We teach in the same district. If one of my band kids turns up positive, then they, the other 109 kids in the class, and the four band directors (we team teach) will have to quarantine for 14 days. But, so will my wife then, since we live together. And then so will her classes that she has come into contact with. Plus our two kids (JH and 4th grade). It’s going to be quite the clusterfuck I’m afraid.
Harvard goes fully online for 2020-2021. I’m expecting more (all) shoes to drop soon.
For the entire year is pretty eye opening. Im pretty sure Cal state and UC schools have only announced for the fall semester
Holy shit
This is even more holy shit:
https://twitter.com/elizabeth_joh/status/1280195187877146625
https://twitter.com/karinfischer/status/1280200916574978053
Trump administration trying to decimate higher education.
Uhhhhhh are these legit sources? That’s huge news.
The second tweet has the link to the ice release about this
Holy fuck that’s really scary and next-level fascism.
Our college president just sent out an email about mask compliance because it is imperative that we offer in-person courses in the fall. Lovely.
Im told that International Centers at all 10 UC campuses plus various other higher ups are currently meeting to decide how to respond to this announcement. Confirmed a Big Deal.
We were already struggling over what to do about incoming students who have been unable to get visas. But this is potentially far worse. I’ve got a PhD student on an f1 and have no idea what to tell him.
Off the record you probably tell him to hide until after November and take the semester doing some consulting work or something.
The word in my circles is that the workaround may be to make sure such students have something to do in person, whether that’s TAing or research hours with you or similar. I wouldn’t tell him anything today. There should be more info soon.
I have to imagine that the set up will be to have optional F2F sessions as a loophole to get around the full online-only ban for international students. The sessions will exist but nobody will ever go. No way are universities going to let that juicy international tuition walk away.
It’s the same approach my school took to opening so they could give students their final exams. There weren’t any seminars but the possibility of them happening existed and that was enough to open the school.
Will these shananigans work for the 10s of thousands of affected students? Perhaps at hybrid schools but it seems hard for a school like Harvard that is explicitly 100 percent online to have thousands of F2F fake courses.
Colleges have got away with way worse.
Anyway, they just have to include occasional F2F review sessions with optional attendance in with the online course. No new material is taught. It’s basically enough to shed the online-only label and make it a hybrid course. Either that or a shitload of students are going to be kicked out.
Or excessive of VPNs.
I hope you’re right.
My school just sent out an email saying that every international student must be enrolled in an in person class or leave the country. It’s happening.
Edit: just F-1 students, I think. But that’s most.