San Jose State President Mary Papazian was joined by her cabinet Thursday morning as they answered questions regarding phasing into a hybrid modality, not decreasing tuition and other difficulties moving into the fall semester amid the coronavirus pandemic.
“It is complex and there are many challenges due to the changing guidance, the different levels of guidance and frankly the unprecedented nature of the pandemic,” Papazian said during the town hall held over Zoom.
Hybrid classes
Vincent Del Casino Jr., SJSU provost and senior vice president of academic affairs, said about 90% of courses offered will be taught remotely.
He said the other 10% of courses like science, technology, dance, art and some graduate courses will be taught in-person using a hybrid model, social distancing and face masks to comply with Santa Clara County health guidelines.
“These basic practices have been shown to really mitigate and reduce risk for the transmission of coronavirus and so we’re going to be implementing these,” Del Casino said.
Students can determine the specifics of their course by looking it up in the updated school catalog.
“If students can’t make it to campus for in-person experience, we’re trying to provide remote options relative to those so that every student has access to the curriculum even if they can’t make it to class,” Del Casino said.
Patrick Day, SJSU vice president for student affairs, asked for students to reach out to him if they are struggling to find housing, especially if they have to come back to San Jose for any in-person classes.
“Our plan only calls for an occupancy rate of about 50%, which is going to leave us room if we have to be flexible at some level,” Day said.
According to Day, the university would also work with students to figure out their housing configuration, along with off-campus partners, if students need to move in the middle of the semester back to campus.
Del Casino said the faculty decided how they wanted to teach their classes, such as if they wanted more Zoom lectures or an asynchronous method, meaning classes wouldn’t have virtual lectures at the same time the class was scheduled for.
“If there are cases where faculty or staff can’t come to campus because of various risk factors and so forth we’re looking at how to mitigate that,” Del Casino said.
Budget and tuition
With tuition payments coming up, Charlie Faas, vice president of administration and finance, wanted to highlight the fact that decreasing tuition would only lead to consequences such as layoffs and a decrease in quality education.
When SJSU received nearly $29 million from the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act, half the money went directly to students while the other half isn't specifically marked yet, but could potentially be going toward instructional-related expenses and maintenance, Faas said.
“Because instruction and related expenses are continuing, it’s not appropriate to reduce tuition,” he said.
Faas said the decision is not made by SJSU but rather by the CSU Chancellor's Office Board of Trustees.
“Reducing tuition and mandatory campus fees amidst these economic impacts of the pandemic would lead us to employee layoffs, it would adversely affect course availability, academic programs and timely graduation,” Faas said.
Fass said even in the midst of the pandemic, the university needs continued financial support in order to make programs available to students virtually and in-person and to train faculty members on how to better teach students online.
“The training, the work that you do, we’ve put a lot of investment into this summer to make the student experience really highly connected,” Del Casino said.
He added that while it’s easy to assume going online makes campus less expensive, the truth is it takes money to ramp up online learning.
“We know we have to invest into the crisis in order to make the teaching and learning experience and the student experience stronger,” Del Casino said.
While the campus has a little over four months of reserves, which is more than most, Faas said it’s not actually a lot for a university.
“We have a systematic plan to use those reserves over the next three years, spending those down will help us not go into lay off mode, not have to go to the reduction in support programming and reducing what we’re trying to do with our academic mission,” said Faas.
Possible employee layoffs
The fear of layoffs was echoed in the town hall as many of the questions revolved around the concern of faculty members losing their jobs, especially when the 2020-2021 California State University budget was announced, which cut $299 million from the CSU system.
“Our mission is to protect the employment of our staff and faculty as fully as we are able,” Papazian said.
In order for the school to avoid layoffs, Papazian said SJSU would need to tap into its reserves.
“We have things set up so that we can resolve this year without having to move toward any significant layoffs at all,” Papazian said.
Another option brought up was CSU Chancellor, Timothy White, giving faculty members what is known as the “Golden Handshake,” which is voluntary early retirement in exchange for more pension time. However, Papazaian said she doesn’t see that happening anytime soon.
“The key driver here is to maintain our enrollment of students,” Papazian said. “Because if we have stable enrollment, we’ll have an active, fully engaged campus, whether we’re remote or in-person and that will mean that we will be able to continue to work with our employees,” she said.
Day said returning student enrollment at the SJSU is expected to be about 35,000 students and remains strong amidst the pandemic, even up from the previous year, however mixed enrollment numbers could be because of international student enrollment declining.
Tracking COVID-19 at SJSU
While the Adapt plan doesn’t necessarily follow a straight path to phase four, once the school does phase people back onto campus they will need to make sure they don’t have the coronavirus, said Traci Ferdolage, SJSU senior associate vice president of facilities, development and operations.
“The university requests that all students, faculty and staff self check for symptoms associated with COVID-19 before coming to campus,” Ferdolage said.
COVID-19 symptoms include: cough, fever, chills, shortness of breath, diarrhea, headache, nausea, vomiting, and loss of taste and smell, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“If you feel sick... and can not attribute these symptoms to any other cause, you may not come to class,” Ferdolage said.
Del Casino said if someone in the class turns out to be COVID-19 positive, that class will move online until further notice and more investigation can be done.
Ferdolage said face masks will be required to be on campus, except for when a faculty member is in their office. If someone does not wear their mask it will be addressed on a case by case basis.
“There are also instances where an individual may not be able to wear a mask, so we need to be conscious and kind to one another,” Ferdolage said.
Ferdolage said the university is working to improve ventilation inside the buildings, as well as posting locations around campus where students, faculty and staff can obtain personal protective equipment and supplies.
“We have been cleaning like crazy all summer long,” Ferdolage said.
There have been 18 confirmed cases of COVID-19 among the SJSU community, according to the university at the time of publication.
Joanne Wright, SJSU Senior Associate Vice President for University Personnel, said faculty members who need help with Wi-Fi, supplies or equipment have the option to come to campus.
International students
Del Casino said any SJSU international student can enroll in a class from their home country, meaning their visa status won’t be affected.
In order to comply however, F-1 graduate students will need to take on at least nine units and undergraduates must take 12 units in order to maintain their visa.
While incoming students will not need a F-1 visa in the fall, it will be needed for in-person classes in the spring.
Student life and services
With most student life taking place online, the question came up of tuition going toward services that are not in-person and how the school plans to operate these services.
“Most activities that are happening on campus are going to continue to happen,” Faas said.
For instance, Faas said the university is looking into having the SRAC pool open so people can swim, as well as opening the Student Union for students to use. He also said eventually he hopes the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Library can reopen its computer labs but for now, students can still use its resources online.
Del Casino said the university is also looking into opening up spaces in the library, but because the library is also a public library, the decision will also be up to the city of San Jose, as well as the Santa Clara County Public Health Department.
Day said even though the school has a plan for large spaces, like weight lifting in the SRAC, the decision to open those facilities will depend on the county’s guidance on when it will be safe to engage in such activities.
“[Campus] certainly won’t look the same, like it did last year,” Day said.
Del Casino said clubs and activities will also continue in the fall semester, whether virtually or in-person.
He said although a plan is in place to move forward with hybrid learning, it’s not inconceivable that it would switch back to fully online by fall.
“As of today, we feel the schedule we have makes a lot of sense, that we could protect everyone and the safety involved based on the schedule, but monitoring the situation and if it needs change, we will make change,” Del Casino said.
A similar town hall discussing the SJSU Adapt plan will take place Tuesday.
