BY JENNIFER RUTH
As Carolyn Betensky’s posts made clear (see here, here and here), universities and colleges are not prepared to safely protect faculty and students as classes begin this fall. Individual crises are erupting everywhere (as this Inside Higher Ed article about more professors quitting over face-to-face teaching mandates details) and some organized actions are also popping up. At Florida Atlantic University, faculty held a rally and submitted a petition to administrators over the conditions on their campus. At a demonstration held in front of the main administrative building, protesters held signs saying “Education not Infection” and gave interviews to the local press decrying the way their governor was playing politics with their lives. They request that FAU:
- Require all students, faculty and staff who plan to live, study or work on campus be fully vaccinated against COVID-19.
- Set up vaccination sites in parking lots, on the breezeway and in other public thoroughfares with high traffic.
- Send regular emails providing vaccination site locations and hours of operation.
- Make it mandatory that all persons on campus wear masks when indoors.
- Allow faculty to be able to modify their instructional delivery, including changing to in-person classes to fully online if needed.
See WPTV article here.
AAUP chapters across the country are on the frontlines of this crisis. They are negotiating with administrators in attempts to protect their members and issuing statements (for one excellent example, see here). If your chapter has issued a statement and/or taken other actions, please submit a post to this blog about what you’ve done so others can be inspired to redouble their own efforts to protect themselves and their members.
