The Interim Presidency Amidst COVID-19

Dr. Robert “Brit” Katz
Interim Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs
University of South Carolina – Upstate (Spartanburg, South Carolina)

Interim Chief Student Affairs Officers face the societal microcosm that is our affected campuses, our work, our students, and our students’ families. Ironically, Student Affairs has never been so central to higher learning than in overcoming the COVID scourge yet never more ignored by television news.

Many of us consider the “interim” title as synonymous with “consultant.” As a consultant, I have witnessed the onset of COVID, then conferred with numerous colleagues about the intra-division synergy of Student Affairs departments’ personnel and services to combat it. In addition, COVID provokes unique combinations of work with Business Affairs, Academic Affairs, and Enrollment Management. 

The admission and matriculation of incoming students is crucial; the partnership of Student Affairs and Health Services while determining how many persons can be invited to campus per event; who will enforce the use of masks, hand sanitizer, and social distancing; where will staff be stationed in support; when is it best to substitute online technology to obtain desired results? Being an interim leader frees me to ask frequent questions of multiple senior leaders about needed collaborations.

The collaboration of Housing officers with Business Affairs leaders ensures that residential occupancy is maximized but prevents COVID-spread. The resulting larger commuter student population forecasts that faculty and Counseling Center therapists need protocols that assist students with mental and emotional health instabilities generated by family health, financial worries, online learning difficulties, and isolation.

Indeed, conversations with our experts in Disability and Accessibility Services have a new intensity. Students with permanent and visible disabilities deserve the accommodations merited by legislation and morality. These accommodations underwent a significant review for Student Affairs, Academic Affairs, Business Affairs, and Enrollment Management when students confirmed that many of their classes and assignments were transferred to remote learning platforms. Faculty and Student Affairs professionals rally around students with visual, aural, or neuroscientific issues that are compounded without in-person class sessions. New equipment has been purchased; existing equipment has been augmented by our friends in Institutional Technology.

Finally, there is the conundrum of developing a campus community of learners with mixed messaging.  Administrators proclaim that you cannot visit campus without meeting numerous restrictions, so students comply; but, when we extend invitations to selected events and traditions, we are frustrated because students do not appear. We will continue to discuss the “push me, pull you” contradictions that truncate the numbers of participants and mutate an understanding of “community.”