Ohio University Faculty Senate is trying to support both professors and students through its work during the COVID-19 pandemic.
In an effort to support and protect professors, Faculty Senate passed a resolution in July that allows professors to require facial coverings in class, according to a previous Post report.
“The mask resolution was really more of a technical detail in that we should have gone through the faculty handbook and discovered that we had put in language — probably in the late 60s early 70s — basically saying professors can't tell students what they can wear in the class unless it's for safety reasons,” Doug Clowe, Finance and Facilities Committee chair, said. “And we just updated it so we could also include things like masks.”
The resolution clarifies a section of the faculty handbook that allows professors to request students to dress a certain way for class activities, according to that same Post report. It also makes additions to a new section of the handbook that states dress requirements for public safety and personal health are only in effect when they are on OU property or at university-sponsored events.
Other than working on developing COVID-19 classroom procedures, such as wearing face coverings and wiping down desks, there are currently no specific plans to pass resolutions related to supporting the community during COVID-19, Robin Muhammad, chair of Faculty Senate, said.
Professors are, however, still receiving support for technological help and budget-related concerns.
“We also have other concerns that we're raising that aren't directly touching on COVID-19, although they are somewhat related, so we continue to have questions about the budget concerns about possible budget cuts in the future,” Muhammad said. “So again, all the things that we were concerned about.”
With all of its concerns, the Faculty Senate is seeking support from OU administrators in the form of better communication.
“The biggest complaints that we've had with the administration sort of over the past six months has just been that they just don't communicate very timely. And I think students have been complaining about this as well, that this is that communications aren't made until decisions are made, and they don't ever talk about the stuff that they're thinking about,” Clowe said. “And so we would love for them to start communicating more about ‘here's something that we need to start thinking about as a community,’ and ‘come up with solutions rather than hear solutions that we've come up with that you may disagree with.’”
Faculty Senators are hoping for collaboration with OU administration in future problem solving and decision making.
“We would like them to work with us, so that maybe we can both … come up with better solutions,” Clowe said. “But even if we can't come up with better solutions, we can at least have the faculty informed ahead of time that these things need to be done and why they need to be done, rather than just having a solution that we don't understand why it's being done dumped on us.”
The concerns Faculty Senate has are those that have persisted since the spring.
“All of the concerns that we had in the spring, are essentially still there,” Muhammad said. “The conditions have changed somewhat, but I think that the concerns about health, health and safety and academic excellence are still present.”
