April 9, 2020 Dear CWU Trustees:
The Academic Department Chairs Organization (ADCO) urges the university leadership to commit to a goal of removing the financial exigency status as soon as possible. The financial exigency status creates a public perspective that counters the many positive adaptations the university has successfully met during the COVID-19 crisis. The academic departments and faculty have successfully brought the entire curriculum online in just a few short weeks. Courses are close to normal enrollment and in some cases actually higher than normal enrollment. Our faculty continue to be excellent and strive to deliver the best educational experience for our students. Here we are in the first week of instruction and students are back studying. In terms of the core value of the university – teaching and learning – we are doing very well adapting to this crisis. In contrast to our positive adaptation, the financial exigency status casts a negative image on the university to the outside public – as if we are struggling and raising questions in future students’ minds as to whether CWU should be the university for them. Well, we have adapted to the online situation and CWU is the university for students looking for a quality education; the financial exigency status confuses this message with the general public and we are concerned that it will harm our future recruitment and retention of students. Therefore we urge the leadership to remove the financial exigency status as soon as is possible. ADCO also stresses the importance of continued financial support to the classroom and faculty resources during this crisis and important adaptation moment. Spending freezes on classroom resources can negatively impact our attempts to continue to move online with high quality. For example, freezing spending may delay the purchase of online delivery equipment such as a digital document camera faculty may need to create lectures. Students decide to enroll in a university, stay or leave based on their classroom experience – cutting classroom funding and therefore quality of the classroom experience at this time would seriously impact our ability to adapt and deliver quality online instruction and will negatively impact the learning experience, recruitment and retention. Finally, the issues of moving a university online and adapting so quickly are extremely complex and require the input of those closest to the classroom; ADCO stresses that shared governance and consultation with faculty leadership is more important than ever. Department of Sociology 400 East University Way • Ellensburg WA 98926-7545 • Office: 509-963-1305 • Fax: 509-963-1308 Farrell Hall, room 409 • Web: www.cwu.edu/sociology EEO/AA/TITLE IX INSTITUTION • FOR ACCOMMODATION E-MAIL: CDS@CWU.EDU This is an electronic communication from Central Washington University.
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