If I Were a College President

Dear (college/university) community,

I initially started this communication with “Dear current students, future students, faculty, staff, alumni, local residents, local/state/national legislators …” but as I listed all the people who have a stake in the past, present and future of our institution, I realized I would fill the page before I had a chance to get to the substance of today’s communication.

I chose “community” because I believe the decisions we make going forward must be done with the well-being of the entire community in mind. We are facing an unprecedented challenge, and only by acting in the interests of the entire community will we be able to navigate the present as we head toward a sustainable future.

I am writing today to answer the question that is on everyone’s mind: “Is school going to open in the fall?”

The answer is: of course. In fact, we are and have been “open” this whole time, and we will be “open” in the fall. It is a personal irritant when some suggest that the only way a school can be said to be “open” is if it is operating according to a pre-pandemic status quo. By that standard, no school will ever be open again, or at least certainly not any time soon.

I believe what most people mean when they ask if school will be “open” is whether or not we will be employing face-to-face classroom instruction in the fall.

The answer to this question is: I don’t know. I hope so, but I don’t know.

What I do know is that, as always, we are preparing to meet our mission of fostering the development of the intellectual, social and economic potential of our community members, regardless of whether or not it is done in person or at a distance. The spring semester of what I call an “emergency shift to distance instruction” has helped us tremendously when it comes to our preparations for the fall, and we are confident that our plans to meet both the curricular and extracurricular needs of students will deliver the kinds of experiences we believe are consistent with our mission.

We will be communicating the details of these plans in the coming days and weeks. The energy and spirit that faculty, staff and students have brought to this period of emergency distance instruction has revealed that we are more than capable of meeting this challenge, particularly with time to prepare.

Another thing I do know is that we will not be opening for in-person instruction if doing so either puts undue risk of serious illness or death on some members of the community, or if some members of our community are excluded from participating because of circumstances beyond their control. Having a pre-existing condition that makes some more susceptible to adverse outcomes if they come into contact with the COVID-19 virus, or having regular contact with others who meet this criteria, is not a justifiable reason for exclusion.

If we put a plan into place that deliberately and purposefully excludes some members of our community, or forces them to choose between their well-being and their participation, we have failed in fulfilling our mission before we have even started.

We will open for face-to-face instruction when it is as safe as reasonably possible in a world in which this virus remains present. No doubt, this will not be the same threshold as before the arrival of this threat, but at this time, as a society, we do not appear to be close to the levels of testing and tracing that most experts believe are necessary to meet this new threshold.

We can be hopeful that this will change, but we cannot wish these realities away simply because we think it is important to “get back to work.” In truth, we have been at work this whole time, and if we must remain distanced to continue to work safely, that is what we will do.

I am well aware that this decision puts the future of our institution at risk. Christina Paxson, the president of Brown University, declared the potential loss of tuition revenue for schools that do not open for face-to-face classes “catastrophic,” saying, “It’s not a question of whether institutions will be forced to permanently close, but how many.”

Like many other colleges and universities, we are dependent on student tuition to fund our operations. If we see a significant shortfall in enrollment in the fall, we will be facing budgetary constraints that will almost certainly cut into core operations.

But please make no mistake, if our institution and others like ours are unable to continue to exist, this is not the result of a failure to open, but of a deliberate choice by our country's legislators and leaders to allow these institutions to die, rather than provide the kind of support necessary to see them through this crisis so they are able to assist in the recovery on the other side.

President Paxson seemed to imply that some number of additional casualties may be an acceptable trade-off for conducting face-to-face classes, but let me put this plainly: there is no minimal number of additional, otherwise preventable deaths that is an acceptable compromise for restarting face-to-face instruction at our institution. A community that deliberately fails to protect its most vulnerable members cannot call itself a community. If this results in our demise because we cannot collectively imagine a world in which we privilege health and well-being over economic activity, so be it.

Even if we are able to weather the current storm, there are few scenarios where institutions like ours -- of which there are thousands across the country -- survive long-term without significant direct financial assistance from state and federal governments. Many institutions were already in precarious financial positions, living semester to semester, and the pandemic has only intensified those existing problems. We must imagine a different future rather than seeking out a past that was not working well to begin with.

The loss of institutions like ours would have catastrophic consequences on the students, faculty and staff who learn and labor inside them, as well as on the communities in which we are situated. To lose these institutions would make an already difficult situation much worse.

This is why I will be joining other college and university presidents in pushing for the kind of monetary support that will leave us positioned to be a lifeline to the members of our community as we move forward.

The amount of funding that will be necessary to meet this challenge is unprecedented, far greater than any of the amounts that have been already disbursed or that I have seen being publicly discussed. The recovery is going to be long and difficult no matter what decisions we make, and it is likely that some institutions will not be able to survive no matter what efforts are undertaken on their behalf. However, I believe that recovery will be better served by preserving our system of colleges and universities as intact as possible, rather than allowing it to wither and die.

Students, you must make the decision that is best aligned with your present circumstances and future goals. If that means taking a semester away from school -- for whatever reason -- we support you in that choice, and we hope to be here when you are ready to return. But please know that we believe what we’re offering in the fall will meet your needs as much as possible under these circumstances. There is no returning to a pre-pandemic world, and waiting for a return to the previous status quo may make for an interminable delay. Figuring out how to live in this new normal cannot be deferred indefinitely.

Reflecting on recent events causes me to realize that as an institution, we have not always lived up to our mission. We have compromised on issues like the compensation and treatment of adjunct faculty, or by raising tuition to fund our budgets and thus increasing the amount of debt with which our students graduate. At the time, these compromises felt necessary, to yes, “keep the doors open.”

I now question that wisdom. Those choices have unfortunately created fractures in our community, which in turn have left our institution fragile. I ask for forgiveness from those members of our community that we have not looked out for in terms of equity and opportunity and pledge that we will do better going forward. This letter is my attempt at living the pledge.

We will get through this because we must get through this, as a community.

All best regards,

John Warner