Encouraging Community Connections
May 19, 2020
Dear Baruch Faculty and Staff,
Connections, of all sorts, are helping the Baruch community cope and even thrive in this very new, very different world of teaching, learning, and otherwise working remotely. As I started to receive reports from some people and departments about steps they were taking to bring their communities together, I thought it would be interesting—and encouraging–to share some of these very creative ways of building and enhancing community at Baruch. It is gratifying and frankly inspiring to see how you and your colleagues have taken extraordinary steps to ensure that we remain resilient, strong, and forward looking.
To support individual and departmental efforts during these personally and professionally challenging times, the Office of the Provost has re-designed and added new material to the Academic Affairs webpage.
We have created a Community Connections webpage. Here are curated stories and resources that showcase examples of how the Baruch community remains engaged and connected during the times of COVID-19. I hope that you not only find them helpful but that they may inspire you to take similar steps to reach out and promote or enhance connections with your Baruch colleagues and students. Think of this webpage as a Virtual Watercooler.
You’ll find stories of fascinating things individuals are doing to inspire and entertain their communities, including:
You’ll also find stories of what Baruch departments and schools are doing to bring students, faculty, and staff together:
- Sharing Stories and Support: #ZicklinTogether microsite, a resource to unify students, faculty, staff, business executives, and alumni through personal stories and educational insights.
- Student Events and Services Go Virtual: Free COVID-19 Support Sessions via Zoom for Students offer a safe, supportive, and nonjudgmental space for students to process the current health crisis and learn coping skills.
- A blog for students, faculty, and staff in the Department of Black and Latino Studies (here)
These are just a few examples. Visit the webpage to see what other departments and individuals are doing. We plan to add to this webpage, so please send me examples of what you’re doing to keep students, faculty, and staff connected, as we are all physically separated. In fact, we’re currently getting ready to add descriptions of interesting material from the Marxe and Weissman Schools, as well as from the Department of English and the Paul H. Chook Department of Information Systems and Statistics.
Planning for Our “Unknown Future”
In addition to maintaining and enhancing our sense of community, even while isolated, we’ll also be looking ahead. Although we may well have more questions than answers about our future, we still need to make plans, as unknown as that future might be. The path-breaking anthropologist Margaret Mead, later in her long career, set out the concept of “planning for an unknown future,” and that’s exactly what we need to do now.
We can do this best, I think, by focusing on key concepts the importance of which are likely to persist in higher education, whatever the details might be. “Enhancing community connections”—which we’ve addressed above and on the webpage—is one such core concept.
Another is always thinking of our students first, which I think is best expressed by our CUNY Graduate Center colleague Cathy Davidson in a provocative recent blog posting on the most important thing to think about for the coming fall semester.
Finally, we need to take this unknowable future firmly in our hands, in as thorough and systematic manner as we can. We may not have all of the answers, but in the coming weeks we will take on these challenges, fill in the blanks, and identify operational plans that will guide us forward. To do so, President-Designate Wu will convene a broadly-representative Task Force on the Future of Education at Baruch, which will begin meeting soon and throughout the summer to weigh options and develop measured, actionable plans. Stay tuned for details!
Here’s what we do know, what the present crisis hasn’t changed and won’t change: Baruch’s three schools will continue to offer top-ranked degrees with flexible self-paced programs, taught by world-class faculty and supported by start-to-finish student services. We will continue to be guided by our historic mission and lead the nation as an engine of social mobility for our students and their families. Our mission is more important than ever!
On a Personal Note
I want to end by expressing my hopes that you, your family, and friends are well in these still-perilous times. And let me express my deepest gratitude and appreciation for all that you have done and continue to do to provide the academic continuity that is essential to our students and the business continuity that enables all of us to do our work.
Baruch is exceptional at rising to challenges, and I look forward to meeting today’s and tomorrow’s challenges together.
Sincerely,
Jim
James McCarthy, PhD
Interim Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs