Mary Rees- Good morning. So good to see everyone or have you all back this week. Another exciting week you're on campus as we get used to the new
Online remote Moorpark College right? Welcome to the April 27 Moorpark College Update. Just a reminder that the update is being recorded. If you are interested, please click the CC at the bottom, in order to have closed captioning
to allow you to see the the all of the captions and subtitles.
The first person speaking will be Interim President Julius Sokenu. Julius?
Julius Sokenu: Hi everyone. I hope that you are having a good Monday and that you had a restful weekend. Thank you again for joining us.
I do want to start off by thanking folks for participating in the virtual planning retreat on Friday. It was great to see
over 100 of you participating. When we got off the call. Shortly after noon on Friday, there was still about 71 people on the call. Thank you so much for
your presence, and also for acknowledging that the planning for the college continues, irrespective of COVID-19. thank you for that. The notes from that meeting and actually the recording of the Zoom conference itself will be available shortly, and that will be posted
to our website so that folks can see that and I'm hoping we can actually send a link
To everyone so that way folks can read through it and for folks who could not attend, they could share their feedback, ask questions and we appreciate and value your insight. As with our retreats,
we broke into small groups during the latter half of the of the time together and those small groups then identified
items to be discussed and to be further shaped into the next
Annual work plan for the college. We will need people who are available to help us do that work, but also, we would need some feedback
once that has been gathered. So please stay tuned, you will get information from from me and from various stakeholders across campus. Definitely from your Academic and Classified Senate and from our student leadership as well.
I also want to call your attention to the fact that, as you can see, we keep doing the work and the semester is almost over. Right? It's
April 27 and I believe the semester is over on the 14th of May. So we have about two weeks left of the semester. I know for faculty
in particular, this is crunch time and this is often a very stressful time in the life of a faculty member. We appreciate you, and we know this is a challenge. Particularly, we know post transition to online instruction for some of us who have not done it in the past. in terms of COVID-19
The conversation now across all,
I would say sort of all
Venues is really what do we do in the Fall? What will Fall look like?
The College District
Cabinet will be at a retreat tomorrow morning from nine to noon, and that's the college presidents, the chancellor, the vice chancellors.
We'll be discussing that. The top item is the Fall schedule, and part of that conversation will be really how do we
maintain our enrollment for the Fall? How do we deliver instruction in the Fall that meets our mission? Is able to support the various needs of our students and is sensitive to the
Global Climate right? Post pandemic, or hopefully the post-pandemic, or at least post the first wave of the pandemic.
So the conversations will be revolving around how do we market to our students? How do we target messages to students who are currently with us, but who may be questioning whether or not to come back? What would that message look like.
And
How do we make sure that those students who are committed to coming to Moorpark College, actually do come to Moorpark College?
And for the ones who have not committed to coming to Moorpark College would have accepted admissions to four-year institutions and who are now questioning whether or not they want to go there. That they see Moorpark College as the
Institution of choice if they choose to stay home. Most importantly for those who are traditional-age students, that their parents see Moorpark College as an institution of choice.
So we'll be working on that with the cabinet tomorrow and then bring it back to campus for campus conversations and our operations.
I also wanted to call your attention to as we continue to do this work of moving forward with the with the Fall. There's been questions as to
why don't we just build a schedule that's mainly on ground, and then if we have to move to
An online setting, we'll do it like we just did this semester and we're already kind of equipped to do that. As I mentioned previously, really, it's the contingency planning that is necessary to make sure that we not only
maintain the integrity of the curriculum and of instruction, but that we also make our lives and the lives of our students
less chaotic and less stressful. If we can sort of build a schedule that is nimble enough so that we have online classes and hybrid classes, and then those hard to convert classes remain on ground, we are at least able to pivot towards the
online environment if that is what we end up doing because of another wave of COVID-19.
In terms of continuing to do the work to reach out and
maintain our enrollment, this Friday there's a breakfast for superintendents and principals in our service area. That's something that we do
every semester and we weren't able to do it in the Fall, because of the fires. We haven't really scheduled one
for this semester. In conversation with a couple of superintendents, in our service area, it was clear that they want to engage us in conversation as we want to engage them in conversation
about post COVID-19. About technology and the availability of technology to our students and addressing the issue of the digital divide.
They want us to be the one to sort of engage with us so that for their students who are
sensitive and concerned about about going away to school that they see us as an option and so we can build pathways together. But it's also again another opportunity for us to sort of share with them what we do and hear from them what they expecting us. But we had planned this
superintendents breakfast in the Fall. It was supposed to be on ground and we were going to focus on communicating to them about our Guided Pathways initiative.
And we're rolling out our guide to Guided Pathways initiative/framework, particularly our meta majors and our maps and
that will still be on the agenda, but that probably just will not be on the top of the agenda at this point. Again it will be an information item but we will address the COVID-19 pieces first.
Again, there's a lots of going on on campus and I know that the questions that you may have. As we continue with this, but
just a quick sort of shout out. I know that our virtual student one act plays are beginning and students would like to direct the attention of the community to those virtual one act plays. Suzanne, if you can type in the information into the Q&A
feature so that folks can get that information and then maybe we can put forward an email that has links etc., to the rest of the college at that where we can promote that activity, that'd be fantastic.
I'm going to pass it on to Jennifer.
Jennifer Clark our Vice President of Business.
Jennifer: Morning everybody happy to be with everybody on this very warm Monday.
I can feel summer coming! It's almost here I wanted to just give take this opportunity to update you and just a couple of areas, couple of key areas.
One technology and the work that we've been talking about and the way that technology has been supporting faculty, staff, students that work continues.
Over 160 laptops have gone out to staff, faculty, students, we've got over 75 I think additional requests people that are mostly students that just have to come by and pick up their laptops.
We have really switched in terms of supporting our employees supporting you supporting, faculty, staff, administrators.
A lot of the work that IT traditionally has done on ground updating and supporting you, with all of your
your help desk needs. A lot of that work is now obviously electronic, it can happen remotely, which is really kind of cool.
So, you know, you're having trouble you can submit a ticket to the tech department
and someone can have a remote session with you. A lot of times they can they can address your problem remotely, which is really kind of neat.
They're able to get other projects done which is the one of the advantages of not having a lot of people around is they have a lot of access to
desktops and laptops that
they may not have a lot of access to during the year. So they're taking advantage of that and updating stuff and so that when everyone does come back to campus,
our items, our technology. A lot of our stuff has been updated and it's ready to go, it's in good shape. So that's good news. I wanted to take an opportunity just to cover again financial aid.
Starting with the CARES Act and then I'm going to go back to the emergency fund grant. The CARES Act as you know, 5 million is coming to
Moorpark from it's federally legislated money. So it's, again, coming from the US federal government. Half of the funds are designated for student emergency aid specifically related to the
event, so about two and a half million specifically for students. The other two and a half million for the campus, for the institution.
Local institutions are deciding and having this conversation now, as to how we might best use those funds here in our district and for Moorpark. Those funds have not yet been released.
The student funds, those are first funds that will be released. We have submitted our application for the first 2,000,005 which again is for the students.
We haven't heard anything from the feds yet as far our application being approved or anything like that, but it's in process, it's been submitted. We're hoping to have a reasonably fast turnaround.
And at this time, our financial aid office as well as the other financial aid offices in the district are working on a process right now to very
efficiently and effectively process applications to see all students who are eligible for CARE funds. That's a process that we're working on right now.
Again, we're not done with it, but we're rapidly ramping it up so that when, by the time funds are ready to be distributed, our process will be ready.
Circling back to the emergency fund grant, those have been around for, you know, several months now. Again,
go right to our website. Student Services, financial aid, there's a giant link you can't miss it.
Students can be full time students, they can be part time students. They don't have to be full time students.
Encourage students to apply and submit supporting documentation, whatever their request, and make sure they
include supporting documentation, because that means that financial aid will have less to do on the back end, that their
applications will be processed a lot more efficiently and much more timely if documentation or support supporting documentation is presented or
Submitted along with the application at the same time. Again, if students aren't hearing anything within a few days to a week
on an emergency fund grant, they should contact and follow up with the financial aid office. Again, the link is on the website.
Our folks are on the phone and on email and ready to go. They're fielding lots and lots of phone calls, lots and lots of requests.
We are here for the students. and we are, helping them to the very best of our ability. Every day. So we encourage students to submit their applications, you know, for emergency funds. Thank you and I will turn the mic over to Mary our Interim Vice President of Academic Affairs.
Mary: Thank you Jennifer, I'm seeing in the questions, something that we wanted to talk about first.
Many of you are seeing students and they're not sure if they're going to be able to finish. They're nervous about how to finish up the class successfully.
Please, I know you're working on doing everything you can to help them, please let them know there are a lot of options for them.
You've got finals coming up the students do not have to do an EW right away.
There was a couple of questions asking what's the deadline for an excuse withdraw, which is the EW, it's a year from now.
An excused withdrawal is a year from now. Does that mean you can finish the class, decide at that point that you didn't
feel comfortable that you had successfully met the outcomes and didn't get the grade you wanted and then decide? Yes.
That's the message there. This is all about helping your students succeed moving towards their educational goals. So, encourage your students to try to finish up this semester.
If they are, then later on want to do an EW they can. Students can also apply to get a pass/no pass. We've gone way past the deadline, but that's fine this semester. Those all have been waived. Students can still until the end of the semester switch their class to a pass/no pass
Neither of these options, the pass/no pass nor the excused withdrawal will affect their GPA.
The students will not be penalized for the excused withdrawal. They'll be able to retake those courses, they'll be able to get their money back, but
if they aren't a student, at least a partial student, some of the fundings do require that they be a partial students with six units.
We'll need to check with financial aid on the specifics, but several have six units, so dropping all of their classes at this point could be very counterproductive for them.
in meeting their short term as well as their long term goals. So I would highly encourage you to
Give your students a pep talk allow them to encouraged, give it a try. See how they're doing. And if they need to go with a pass. No pass if they get a C, but they're not comfortable, the impact of that on their GPA, the pass, no pass does not affect their GPA.
The excuse withdrawal, they can get it a whole year from now if your students did it excuse withdraw right away.
In a kind of a panic mode feeling overwhelmed by everything they can be. And they now want to finish up the class.
Yes, you can work with them on that, if that's what they're wanting to do and you think that's a reasonable outcome for them. So work with your students on helping them complete the class.
Work with the students so that if a pass, no pass is appropriate their counselors can help them with... advise them depending on where they're looking to transfer
There's a lot of information, a lot of workshops available to help provide information to the students. Their counselors, they can set up appointments online to work with the counselors.
For tag, which is the transfer agreements, there's workshops. In fact, the numbers are way up for the number of students that are signing up for these
transfer basics, career basic, the tag workshops, because the students are interested in getting information on what to do to help them transfer because the availability, they might have been required... needing this course that they're now wanting to drop,
in order to transfer hopefully in the fall, or whenever they're looking to transfer. So it's really important that we try to help our students
complete the circle on these. Some of them are thinking well they'll just take the courses this summer. Our summer offerings are all online, with the exception of our EATM, and our allied health which some of them are on ground.
So they're still going to have the online course and some of the courses are not being offered. Just a reminder to the faculty as well
though that I was just talking with Jazelle and UCSB and USC once again have let us know that online labs will be accepted. So if you have a particular lab that you're wanting to offer that you know your students need,
we can, our counselors can double check. We can work with you, if you, if you, as a faculty are worried that the UC'S won't be comfortable with the online.
We're hearing over and over again that they are all online and they understand the needs to provide these labs online. So
if we're looking to add additional lab classes to talk with the deans about adding additional ones on. I know that there are a lot of students that are looking to make up some classes this summer
and are hoping that we're going to offer it. And there's some needs that they have that we don't currently look to be offering this summer. So
if you are comfortable with offering additional classes, talk with your deans and we'll look at that. We are in the process of enrolling for summer and for fall
and we are trying to be very responsive to what our students need. Some of them do need these courses to get back on track from this, from this spring, it's thrown them off.
Excuse me.
So on the...
For fall courses we were talking about the...
Most of them are being, well, there'll be a mixture of online, on ground. There's a lot of questions. Will I have to wear a face mask? How many people will be in my classroom? Will there be the 15 max or, the minimum?
All of those are great questions and you'll have to give us a little bit more time as Julia said until they have the retreat, as well as we get a little bit more information from
the public health as far as when we do come back off of this stay at home order. What will be the requirements regarding social distancing. So
we would be completely speculating as far as whether masks are required, the numbers in a particular gathering place, things like that. But as soon as any of that is
is defined, we will clearly be there meeting and and letting you know that information. We're trying to set up contingency as we know we're talking about
what about each of the classes, what we will do if we have to go online, and working with all of you to have plans, so that we can be a smooth transition, if we need to. But basically, we need to just set up contingencies and move
strongly and steadily towards helping our students accomplish what they want to.
One of the other the other questions that people often have are about our DE certifications. I'm going to send out an email this morning
really clearly defining what's involved as far as all of the outcomes. What DE certification isn't and isn't.
The number of you that have stepped forward and wanting to get DE certified is absolutely incredible. We have over 64 currently in the DE certification that's ongoing. And there's almost 80 or more than 80 that have signed up for the one starting May 18. Absolutely incredible. Thank you.
We might ask if some of you can move to a June session if that works for you. We will get specifics as far as when that
third DE certification course will be starting and then provide that information to you.
But I'll send you out specific information that talks about what's in the DE certification. It's a
specific four week 10 hour course that provides both the technology and the pedagogy for teaching online using best practices.
We have provided a lot of additional trainings that are just supplemental that are about specific software specific needs but are not the certification and
hopefully that'll all be clarified, additionally, in the email sending out.
We also are doing DE recertification. We've got one ongoing for those of you that were certified in the past but want a refresher.
Which is absolutely phenomenal. There's over 40 of you that are doing that. And there's another group that are interested when the second one gets set and soon as that date is
established will let you know on that. So a lot going on. Please be there for your students as I know you are. And let us know what we can do to help you.
Meet your students needs. Provide you with the resources you need to offer your courses for your students in the summer. Help you provide the flexibility that you need in order to provide optimal offerings in the fall.
Emmanuel. Can I turn the questions over or the update over to you.
Amanuel Gebru: Yes, thank you Mary. I just have a couple of updates. Just continue to please encourage students to register for summer and fall
and if students need assistance, they can make an appointment, but they can also see a counselor with their express counseling, which will allow them to at least talk to them for maybe 15 or 20 minutes or longer depending on availability.
A couple of other updates. Also, our multicultural day coordinator position as well as our dual enrollment faculty liaison positions, those are
part time positions that will be flying so please encourage folks to apply or yourself if you're interested in those two positions they should be online in the next few days, hopefully for folks to apply.
And then we also have nine sections for dual enrollment during summer that we're offering, they will be all online for the counseling business and criminal justice. So we have some courses that we're still offering for dual enrollment in the summer time.
And also there's some pop up pantries that have (indistinguishable)
Starting today, 4/27 at 1pm at Ventura fairgrounds Ojai, Oxnard, Thousand Oaks, Santa Paula, and Moorpark. The Moorpark, Simi Valley one is on May 3 so I will have this posted
on our financial aid website. It didn't allow me to post it in a group in the chat section. We'll see if we can get that information out to you and the student. So that's all the updates I have for my area.
Marry, back to you.
Mary: Thank you, Amanual. Julius, we have lots of questions.
Julius: Yes. Mary: Okay.
This one. Any update on the hiring freeze?
Julius: There is no hiring freeze. Let's just be very clear about that. We are not in a hiring freeze, not this academic year anyway. Yes you know i i one of the challenges that we're all aware of is that this is not just a health crisis. This is an economic crisis and that we are...
The economy of our state and the economy of our country is taking a beating right now and will probably continue to, but there is no no
talk... no talk of a hiring freeze in our district right now. And so there is-we are planning to hire the faculty that we had set up to hire. We are planning to hire the
administrators that we set up to hire for the fall semester. We are making decisions where we see that there are folks who are
in house who are underemployed. And in house, I mean the other three colleges of the districts, plus the District administrative center.
We are making decisions that when those-when instances come up and a college has a vacancy and someone from another campus who's underemployed can do that work that we privilege that person first. And that really is just smart
planning. We do not want to lay off anyone. We do not want to create a situation where we exacerbate the economic hardships in our community and we do that by instigating
An instant hiring freeze in our district. But at this point in time we don't have to. But we do need to be-we do need to be what's the word I'm looking for.
Cautious. And we do need to be
thoughtful in the way we-we hire and we recruit and in where we utilize our resources, but there is no hiring freeze right now.
Mary: Thank you Julius.
Students that have transferred from Moorpark. Graduated in our home from UC and Cal states. Can they take our classes?
Julius: Oh yes, they can. And we encourage them to take our classes. And actually, I know. I think it was last year we were talking about actually putting ads in Seesaw, and in Channel Island, and CLU student newspapers.
So that we could recruit those students who are interested in coming, but yes, they can. And it is a very easy and straightforward approach-a method.
Just like they would apply to the college to take classes and enroll. It's just the same process. And if they have if they have questions. We can certainly have assistance from our counseling assistance and our counseling faculty to support them through that.
Mary: Thank you. A couple of questions too. So if
If people take a
Pass no pass. Can they retake the class later on ground in the future.
Julius: Oh, that's a very good question.
I don't actually know the answer to that. That's a good question and something that we would have to research because a pass, no pass suggests
success a passage is successful completion of the course. So to me, that would mean they pass the class. But as you know, there's a lot we're waiving for the extenuating circumstance, so I am not sure if that still holds. That's a good one. Let's research that. I don't know the answer.
Mary: Manual or Jennifer, could you redefine for the group, what are the hours for the food bank. I understand there's new hours.
Amanuel: posted it just now, its 1 to 4 pm are the new hours for the food pantry, but the pop up food pantries are going to be in the community. So we'll try to post those somewhere.
Online either in the financial aid website or we'll see if maybe Matt can post it on the group chat, because I wasn't able to do so.
Mary: Thank you. Questions about safety measures on campus. Sneeze guards, room sizes, minimums-maximum numbers within a room, masks. Julius, do you want to say anything about or Jennifer about what our general processes will be as far as safety on campus.
Julius: I mean in terms of the fall semester in terms of summer.
Mary: In terms of fall
Julius: Well, okay. So I think I responded to someone's question saying that at this point we have not decided or made any sort of
plans around safety for the fall. The one thing we expect is that once we are allowed to come back on campus and offer instruction on ground that
we will be subject to whatever conditions the Ventura County Public Health has established and then we live by those and if those require that we have
a specific distance between students or class size, we will have to do that. One of the conversations will be happening tomorrow on our retreat is this. Here's some options. You could have totally face to face.
You could have partially face to face, you could have the college open and you stagger hours, you could have the college open
and you reduce the number-you increase the number of sections because you change the class sizes, you could have the College open, but only certain sections of the college open,
you know, certain kinds of instruction delivered. There's a whole range of potential scenarios. We don't know all of them. The ones that we can clearly plan for are the online,
on ground hybrid. Those are the ones who kind of know. There are colleges in our system that have gone back to offering
correspondence courses. I mean, I can't even imagine having to take a correspondence course but people who are doing that as a way of addressing
the, the Covid pandemic. So there's a lot that we don't currently know. And some of this, I wish I could tell you this is what we'll do, until we get the okay from Ventura County Public Health. Until we look at
state policy or even federal policy on-on you know on what social distancing protocols needs to be put in place. We can't tell you.
The hope is that, you know, we won't have to jeopardize our class sizes.
Because if we're already struggling for enrollment. If we had to limit class size to 12 students, it will financially ruin us as a college district.
And so, for sure. That would be something that we couldn't really support. I couldn't support that because we would be able to not only meet demand, but we will be jeopardizing the fiscal stability of our district.
Mary: Julius, those are the times when hybrids and-and being creative with our online and our remote
provides us greater flexibility, correct?
Julius: Correct, very correct. Thank you, Mary.
Mary: Questions about the-from the child development center if any decisions have been made at that or when those decisions will be made.
Julius: Yes. So the decision was to close the child development centers for the rest of the spring semester.
There is an understanding at least at our college that we offer enrichment opportunities for the children
during the summer and that I believe we're going to start that towards the end of this...of the end of May and into June and that conversation is yet to be had, as to when we will go ahead and do that. We are looking currently at...
we've submitted some...
waivers, or actually the permission to deliver offer instruction on ground to Ventura County Public Health. So, for example, taking a nursing one in us into students to go back into their clinical settings.
I know Ventura is asking for setting up their programs to be able to do that as well. And so each each college is is asking for that and we forwarded them to Ventura County Public Health.
And we have not heard back and some of those. And it's been over a week. So we know that once we start hearing back there may be some conditions for that.
And those conditions will then define, you know, how we actually operationalize
the delivery of instruction and services. So as for the child development center as I cannot tell you that we will be open at the end of May, because we don't know.
And we would have to be able to go back to Ventura County Public Health and get approval. I know someone had said in a passing conversation that child development centers are actually essential.
Particularly for parents who are essential workers and may not have a place to take their kids. That has not been...even though that's been said, that has not been the the practice in this county.
So, so far we've closed our child development centers and they will remain closed until we get further direction to open.
Mary: Thank you. There was a question about, is there a way to let the rest of the campus and more people know about the opportunity for students to get funding from care. Is there an email going out to all students, or is there something that we can do on that?
Jennifer: Yeah, I can actually address that. The cares funding, so I said earlier in my update that the financial aid officers are working with IT. The financial aid officers throughout our district. So we're working with our sister campuses in the district office on this, on our process for
you know streamlining the application process. Basically because students have to qualify for cares money, those students are actually going to, we're actually going to be reaching out to them. We're going to be notifying them that they that they qualify.
Julius: So I got a response to the
to the pass, no pass and it's repeatability and yes you can repeat pass, no pass classes.
Mary: Thank you. Thank you both. Also we'll try to make sure that we put out, when we send out information to students that the care opportunity to tell them to be sure and check for financial aid office Jennifer on on that as well.
I do know, people were-there a couple of concerns about zoom over the weekend, but it looks like that's been resolved, and I understand that's additional frustration for systems that where you're working really hard and that goes down. So I'm sure that was very frustrating.
Let's see.
Julius, do you want a...
First a question on the bookstore and then maybe re-going over what our graduation process is because our...so that they can make sure that our students all know that.
But they're wondering whether the bookstore might be able to set up curbside drop off and pick up rather than have them sent through the mail.
if that's an option.
Julius: I saw that question. I was going to have a conversation with Jennifer so that we could reach out to Barnes and Noble and see if they would be able to accommodate that request and
and how that would fall into our
social distancing protocols, because I think that's actually what matters. That means that are we in violation of social distancing protocols or not. And how do we build a
process so that we're not. Because I mean there are colleges across the state who are doing it, actually we're doing it you know we're giving them computers and they're coming and picking it up at a scheduled time and
folks are in safety gear. So I'm guessing that we could do that as well. But I will leave that to Jennifer to reach out to Barnes and Nobles and let us know what the direction will be.
Mary: Thank you, Jennifer. There's a question that asked if the student wants to apply for the emergency grant, but doesn't successfully finished the class. Do they have to give the money back.
Jennifer: That's actually an excellent question. I will have to follow up. I will...let me see if I get a message to Kim.
My guess is no but i-i let me-let me find out from Kim whether or not that's true or not.
Mary: My guess is, I think they have to be a student at the time. I think
Correct.
Jennifer: That's, that's my thought is as long as they are a student at the time.
But let me just double check to make sure that's true.
Mary: Thank you.
So far as the emergency funds. There's a lot of questions about how much is involved? How do the students apply? How are the funds awarded? How long can they reapply later?
Those type of...Is there a place where people can go to get information or send their students to regarding the emergency fund.
Jennifer: As far as the emergency fund is concerned, again, the application is available online. They need to go to student services, click on the financial aid link, and it's right there. The big button at the top of the page.
The emergency fund grants are usually...they tend to be smaller amounts. I mean we are talking, usually, you know, in the hundreds of dollars, not in the thousands.
There, you know, there isn't specific dollar, you know, minimum or maximum kind of a thing. There are no hard and fast on that.
But again, students should be, they need to be current students, part time or full time. They...it's a one page application they need to submit. They need to make their requests.
State what what they need the funds for. Is it to pay rent? Is it for a laptop? Is it for childcare? Is it for food. Is it for...I mean, you know, describe the nee. Provide
you know, documentation, you know, my child care provider has closed. You know, an email from your child care provider is fine for documentation. Anything like that that can help support, you know, the need.
I don't believe food. I don't believe there's any kind of documentation needed for a food request.
I'm sorry, what were some of the other questions, Mary. That was like there were like six questions in there.
Mary: I was just wondering if there was a place where you could have frequently asked questions regarding that. So that if people do have questions that they could...
Jennifer: Yeah, actually that's a good idea. Let me talk to Kim about that, about an FAQ. It's a great idea.
Mary: There was a question about if students want to get a continuation on a course. So I assume that what they're asking for is whether they can get an I, an incomplete.
Mary: What is our process on that.
Julius: So with the incomplete. It encompasses a grade that is assigned by the instructor. And an incomplete assumes that a student has kept a C or better in the class prior to
that experience, you know, prior to the request. That was traditionally the incomplete protocol.
My assumption is that like with everything else. This is probably-we could, it would be context dependent.
So I would say, you know, this is something that a student has a conversation with the instructor.
And the instructor then kind of provides them guidance and offers them the option of a pass, no pass. Offers them the option of the EW, you know, talks to them about, you know, potential ways in which they can meet the course objectives.
Jennifer: If I can jump in for a second.
Kim already got back to me on the other question about the...
the emergency withdrawal and if they had had an emergency fund grant and they don't pass the class and they have to pay it back.
What our, our guts. We're totally correct as long as they're a student at that time they get the grant. If they don't pass the class that they don't need to repay the money.
Mary: Thank
Thank you.
Saw this morning's paper, The Wall Street Journal, about looking at pictures of animals in order to
reduce stress in that. Do we have anything like that for our students.
Julius: Animals for our students?
They-they can go to the EATM website and they can look at pictures of animals all day.
They're available to everyone. It's free.
That would be how I would say they do it. EATM has been phenomenal in its production of online content.
I mean over the weekend. I think I saw two or three different videos of EATM at least over the past couple of days. So I would say
we direct them to the EATM website. Or we also tell them if they're interested. They can adopt an animal, and that animal can be supported by them and
they will get frequent updates on the well being and the activities of that particular animal. And that supports the EATM program as well.
Mary: Thank you so much.
I think that is most of the questions we've talked about.
People are, you know, looking for options for their students. We just encourage you to reach out to financial aid. Reach out to emergency funding. Reach out to the care grant.
Look at what's best for your students. See if their are options, and EW is a-is a resort or an option for them. But there are other things.
Tutoring is still active and ongoing, and student council...or a lot of counseling is available, so I know where there's a lot of options that you all are providing for your students. So Julius, any last words before we close to this week.
Julius: Sure. I'm just to again to remind folks and to thank folks for the grace that you extend to one another that you extend to the students.
We appreciate that. But as we know, as always, the last few weeks of the semester are challenging for many of us. And not just the students. So please, please, please be apathetic be gracious. We know you are already just restating it.
Hope you have a good rest of the week and we look forward to seeing some other zoom engagement. Take care.