M
ore than seven weeks have
passed since Gov. Gretchen
Whitmer issued Executive
Order 2020-21, urging all Michigan resi-
dents, except essential workers, to stay
home to combat the spread of COVID-
19. Life on campus had already been
uprooted, with classes being moved
online and University President Mark
Schlissel urging students to return
home if they were able. All non-essential
businesses were closed, jobs were lost
and some local businesses even closed
their doors permanently due to financial
turmoil. Decreasing numbers of new
cases of COVID-19 in Michigan and
recent protests against stay-at-home
orders have sparked a conversation
regarding whether we are ready to loos-
en restrictions and begin reopening our
state’s economy. This leaves University
of Michigan students wondering what
we can expect for the fall 2020 semester.
Schlissel has spoken of having a
“public health informed fall semester,”
with ideas being thrown around to hold
large classes online and smaller classes
in person. This would include urging
students to wear masks and reducing
student density in campus buildings.
His announcement followed news that
the University’s losses from the pan-
demic could range from $400 million
to $1 billion. Since other universities
in Michigan have already announced
plans to have online classes in their fall
semesters, Schlissel’s optimism to open
campus again seems to be somewhat
financially motivated. However, since
a vaccine for COVID-19 won’t be avail-
able for at least a year, it is crucial that
we rebuild our campus infrastructure
to allow for high-quality learning while
still taking the proper precautions to
keep our students and faculty safe. This
is precisely what the University is trying
to do.
If the University makes an effort to
enforce social distancing in classes held
in person, decreases student density in
campus buildings and asks students to
wear masks on campus, returning to
campus could be feasible. However, an
issue arises when considering social life
on campus. The school may ban large
gatherings, but they lack power when
it comes to off-campus gatherings and
nightlife.
In public health, when we cre-
ate interventions meant to better the
health of the public, we evaluate the
amount of individual effort needed.
Interventions that depend more on
individual participation are less effec-
tive than those which rely on gov-
ernmental authority. For example,
executive orders that are more strict
with their stay-at-home requirements
and qualifying essential businesses
would be more effective than simply
asking people to stay home. In context,
this means that keeping campus closed,
holding classes online and urging stu-
dents not to move back to Ann Arbor
would be more effective than asking
students to follow the recommended
guidelines. Since this doesn’t seem to be
financially practical for the University,
I believe Schlissel wants to do what he
can to open campus and bring students
back. This means that we, the students,
hold the responsibility of reducing the
spread of COVID-19.
Whether we agree with prioritiz-
ing University finances during the
pandemic, we all can admit that we
would love to return to some kind of
normal. As students who just lost half
of a semester and already miss their
campus and friends, doing our part to
reduce the spread of the virus is going
to be incredibly difficult. We are all
desperate to return to school, see
our friends, go to tailgates and enjoy
what is left of our college experience.
We will want to throw parties, go to
Rick’s and enjoy a game day.
As a rising senior, I feel this too,
but as a public health student, I’m
afraid that opening campus and
bringing tens of thousands of stu-
dents back to Ann Arbor is a danger-
ous idea. Many of us will care more
about having these college experi-
ences than we do about hypotheti-
cally getting ourselves or someone
else sick. We think that it will never
actually affect us, and if it does, our
youth and health will protect us
from severe illness.
Unfortunately, there is still so much
we don’t know about the virus. People
in their 30s and 40s have been suffer-
ing severe strokes caused by COVID-
19. Many of the impacts the virus can
have on younger, healthy populations
are still unknown. Because of this, we
cannot just assume that our campus
population is young, healthy and able
to survive the virus without serious
complications. We must consider our
peers who are immunocompromised,
our older faculty, staff and the sur-
rounding Ann Arbor community.
4
Thursday, May 14, 2020
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
OPINION
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ELAYNA SWIFT | COLUMNIST
Elayna Swift can be reached at
elaynads@umich.edu.
What we can expect for Fall 2020
T
he University of Michigan’s
Board of Regents is consider-
ing revisions to Bylaws 5.09
and 5.10, which have to do with the
demotion or dismissal of faculty mem-
bers. The bylaws are the University’s
legal constitution — they are an expres-
sion of our values, just as the U.S. Con-
stitution expresses American national
values. It is thus of great concern to
me, and to many other University fac-
ulty, that some of the proposed changes
weaken academic freedom and erode
the institution of tenure. The University
should be a leader in supporting these
institutions, not undermining them.
Last fall, I was asked to join a work-
ing group of faculty to make recom-
mendations for revisions to Bylaws
5.09 and 5.10. Though never officially
acknowledged, it seemed clear that at
least some of the impetus for revisions
came in response to a recent 5.09 case
that involved an allegation of sexual
assault.
Under the existing bylaws, a faculty
member charged under 5.09 continues
to receive their salary and benefits until
the proceedings come to a conclusion.
Thus, it can happen — as it did in that
recent case — that a faculty member
accused of a heinous crime receives full
compensation while the formal 5.09
process unfolds over several months.
(We were told that a typical 5.09 case
can take about nine months to com-
plete, though many end sooner through
faculty resignation.)
I am as unhappy as anyone to see fac-
ulty members apparently guilty of seri-
ous crimes compensated with public
funds during a lengthy dismissal pro-
cedure. But, the operative word here is
“apparently”: To protect those who
are innocent despite the appearance of
guilt, we need a robust due process in
every case, particularly in the case of
tenure — the closest thing we have to a
sacred institution at modern research
universities.
The proposed revisions allow for
a process occurring simultaneously
with the main 5.09 hearing that would
allow the president, under certain cir-
cumstances, to suspend the salary of
an accused faculty member before the
main hearing comes to a judgment of
guilt. There are many problems with
the proposal such as augmenting the
president’s power over the proceedings,
no compensation if found not guilty,
poor definitions, racial bias and lack of
protection for non-tenure track faculty
altogether. But, arguably the greatest
problem is the very possibility of sus-
pending pay prior to the completion of
the main hearing.
Such a provision violates the fun-
damental principle of “innocent until
proven guilty.” Assuming that the main
5.09 hearing includes the robust due
process we believe necessary for dis-
missing a tenured professor, then why
should anything less be acceptable for
removing pay, the main intention of
tenure?
Allowing the president to suspend
pay all but gives the president the power
to fire a tenured faculty member at will
— exactly what tenure is meant to guard
against. Imagine that a faculty member
writes public op-eds about a controver-
sial political issue. The University may
come under fire for the op-ed, even if
the contents are protected under the
First Amendment and by the principle
of academic freedom. The University
may suffer declines in alumni dona-
tions, and the president might decide
it would be best to remove the faculty
member. Digging up an unverified
anonymous complaint, the president
could then invoke 5.09 and suspend pay
(it would be easy enough for someone
with the authority of the president to
find three committee members willing
to go along with the decision). Without
pay, the faculty member might not be
able to eke out a living, much less sus-
tain the legal fees required to mount an
effective defense against the Universi-
ty’s well-funded legal team. They might
give up and resign or lose in the hear-
ing, even if innocent. I do not expect
that any reasonable president would
do such a thing, but one reason we have
bylaws at all is to protect against arbi-
trary authority and the abuse of power.
And unfortunately, abuses of power
do happen. Bylaw 5.09 was added in the
aftermath of the McCarthy era, when
three University of Michigan faculty
members — Chandler Davis, Clement
Markert and Mark Nickerson — were
suspended, with Davis and Markert
eventually terminated, for acting on
their conscience and refusing to tes-
tify before the House Un-American
Activities Committee. The Univer-
sity was subsequently censured by
the American Association of Univer-
sity Professors, the foremost institution
representing faculty at American uni-
versities, and the bylaws were instated
in response. The AAUP continues to
recommend that major sanctions such
as suspension of pay “should not be
imposed until after a hearing in which
the same procedures apply as in a
dismissal case.” The proposed bylaw
revisions go against this AAUP rec-
ommendation, against the practices
of most of our peer universities and
against the original spirit in which the
bylaws were enacted.
Keep tenure protections robust
KENTARO TOYAMA | OP-ED
Kentaro Toyama is W.K. Kellogg Professor
of Community Information at the School of
Information and can be reached at
toyama@umich.edu.
Read more at MichiganDaily.com
Read more at MichiganDaily.com