In Contrast to How BU is Handling Classes, This is What True Commitment to Protecting Public Health - and Antiracist Policy - Looks Like
Dean initially said it would hold classes on campus starting Sept. 1 but will move classes online following Thanksgiving break. Finals would be held online.
But citing worsening conditions across the country — 7-day averages of new daily cases have exceeded 50,000 through the month of July — led Dean to reverse course. The college is consulting with medical and public health officials.
"This decision was made with our firm belief that the safety of our entire community cannot and will not be compromised," Dean President Paula Rooney wrote in a message online to the campus community. "Though we are confident this decision is the right one, we profoundly share in everyone’s disappointment as we were all looking forward to the return of our students to campus this fall.
"This decision was by far the most difficult in my 47-year career in higher education," Rooney, the Dean president for 25 years, said."
Whitman College
"I know how disappointing this news may be. I truly hoped that we would be together on campus again this fall and start the academic year with some bit of normalcy. However, I believe this is the right decision for the health and safety of our students, faculty and staff. That has always been and will always be my top priority."
UMass Boston
"Through your eyes, we see just how profoundly your lives have been impacted by the pandemic and how much you wish—as do we all—that we could turn this page and go back to all of the activities and friendships that are the stuff of life. We greatly appreciate the many expressions of support for the prioritization of health and safety reflected in our fall plans. ... Many members of our community expressed their approval and support for the plan to continue to operate remotely. They noted that they themselves or members of their family are at risk, especially in Black and Latinx communities nearby that have suffered disproportionately from COVID-19. Social distancing is hard to do on public transit. These respondents agree that a remote semester in the fall, while not perfect by any means, is the safest alternative given the pandemic we must deal with."
Boston University School of Public Health (in contrast)
Given the fact that COVID-19 is out of control this summer, that cases are rising in Massachusetts, and that evidence has already demonstrated that it is impossible to adequately control the spread of coronavirus simply through testing and contact tracing, the decision to hold in-person classes, which requires many faculty and staff to spend long hours in a confined, indoor classroom with a large number of students, demonstrates a compromising of the safety of the entire community.
Moreover, this is a violation of the principle of racial justice that our School supposedly prides itself on. It is troubling to me that we are spending so much time taking mandatory "diversity training" tutorials, yet at the same time the institution is showing a disregard for the lives of Black and Brown people who are being disproportionately affected by the pandemic, and whose lives are most being put at risk by the decision to hold in-person classes this fall.
Data from the COVID Racial Data Tracker demonstrates that COVID-19 is disproportionately affecting communities of color. In particular, Black people are dying from this disease at 2.5 times the rate of White people. In Massachusetts, Black and Latino people comprise 19% of the population but account for 43% of the cases. Importantly, while only 13% of deaths among White people are individuals under the age of 65, one-third of deaths among Black people are in this younger age category.
It should not escape notice that back in March, when the victims of COVID-19 were primarily wealthy, White people, the School shut its classroom doors immediately even when there only about five reported cases. Now, we're ready to open our classroom doors even though there have already been more than 8,000 deaths and there are many more cases occurring today than at the time we closed our doors in the first place.
The racist element in BU's decision can easily be seen by contrasting our policy with that of most historically Black colleges and universities, which--despite much more severe financial repercussions--have nevertheless made the decision that protecting the health of the most vulnerable communities must take precedence over financial concerns.
According to a Politico article: "Colette Pierce Burnette, president of Huston-Tillotson University, a private HBCU in Austin, Texas, said that before announcing class would be online-only in the fall, the school examined and gauged more than a dozen scenarios for reopening, in addition to holding listening sessions and surveying students. 'A tipping point for us was ... the trends that were beginning to show about vulnerability of populations of color,' Burnette said. About 87 percent of all HTU employees are people of color, Burnette said, and 99 percent of its students are people of color. “So the best choice was clearly to make the choice for the health and safety of the students and the people who serve them,” she said."
At Boston University, while Black and Brown students do not comprise a majority of the population, why should their health be valued any less than that of students at schools that do have a high proportion of students of color? Moreover, the employees who are forced to do the things necessary to hold in-person classes (for example, to maintain the classrooms and clean the classrooms, building, elevators, and rest rooms) are disproportionately people of color. Is it fair to ask them to shoulder the burden of severe health risk so that our predominantly White student population can enjoy in-person classes?
So at the end of the day, the School of Public Health may be saving some money. But it is coming at the expense of compromising both public health principles and principles of racial justice.
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