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Virginia Colleges React To Coronavirus Pandemic

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Extending spring break, cancelling campus events, and holding classes online are some of the ways colleges in Virginia are attempting to slow the spread of the coronavirus within their student body, faculty, and staff.

Virginia colleges and universities are extending spring break and adapting online classes amid the new coronavirus — along with more than 100 universities nationwide and still counting — after the flu-like illness was declared a world pandemic on Wednesday.

There are nine presumptive positive COVID-19 cases in Virginia, according to the Virginia Department of Health. Most of them are in Northern Virginia, with one confirmed case in Central Virginia.

Professors are quickly pivoting to get material online, and some schools, like Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, are offering resources to help teachers adjust. Many students have expressed concern over lack of digital equipment and internet access.

Most universities are cancelling events with more than 100 attendees and have online resources for students to access updated information. Many colleges have canceled in-person classes, but faculty and staff will continue to work on campus. Below is a sample of universities that have changed schedules to help prevent the spread of the new coronavirus. 

Outbreak response in action: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) staff support the COVID-19 response in the CDC’s Emergency Operations Center (EOC). Photo from the Centers for Disease Control, used with permission.

James Madison University will extend their spring break until March 23 and will teach online classes until April 5. JMU President Jonathan Alger said in a release that students will be updated on the remainder of the semester on March 27.

Longwood University will be closed until March 18, cancelling in-person classes and events following a presumptive positive diagnosis for a Longwood student on Wednesday. In a release, Longwood President W. Taylor Reveley said faculty would continue to prepare for the possibility of online classes.

Norfolk State University extended spring break until March 23 and will teach classes online until April 6. University residences will reopen March 22.

Old Dominion University will resume classes online on March 23 after an extended spring break. ODU President John Broderick said in a statement posted on Facebook that the school would monitor the situation and reassess on April 6. 

Radford University extended its spring break for an additional week and plans to teach online until April 17, according to the university’s website. The university – as most academic institutions are doing – asked that faculty, staff and students complete voluntary travel declaration forms.

“The information will be shared with local health officials as needed on a case-by-case basis,” Radford President Brian Hemphill said in a release. “For those who traveled, the University may ask individuals to self-monitor or self-isolate for two weeks, depending upon the locations that were visited and the activities that were engaged in.”

University of Richmond extended spring break, cancelling classes from March 16-20, and will hold online classes until at least April 3.

The school’s website states that students with extenuating circumstances, such as international students, can submit a petition to stay in on-campus housing, although access to student services and facilities will be limited.

University of Virginia students will also move to online courses starting on March 19, according to a release from U.Va. President James Ryan posted on Wednesday.

“We will not be holding classes on Grounds for the foreseeable future, quite possibly through the end of the semester,” Ryan said in a release. “We will reassess after April 5 at the earliest and periodically after that date.”

Photo via VCU-CNS

Virginia Commonwealth University announced Wednesday that it will extend its spring break for an additional week. When the semester resumes on March 23, classes will be taught remotely for the “foreseeable future.” Classrooms are expected to use digital tools such as Blackboard, videoconferencing and online programs. 

The release from VCU President Michael Rao said details regarding on-campus housing, student services and dining plans are forthcoming.

“I also want to take this opportunity to thank you for being mindful and respectful of others during this outbreak, which is not limited to any particular age group, geographic region, nationality, ethnicity or race,” Rao said.

Virginia Tech’s spring break is extended to March 23, with a transition to online courses for the remainder of the semester. All events with over 100 people are cancelled through at least April 30, though May commencement plans are still in place. 

“Our campus administrators, public health experts, and community leaders have been continuously engaged in monitoring the situation in Blacksburg, across Virginia, and around the world,” a release stated. “In consultation with our partners in the Virginia Department of Health, we are adopting a range of principle-based actions, effective immediately.”

William & Mary will start online classes March 23, after an extended spring break, to continue until at least April 1. University events are cancelled until April 3.

Virginia State University announced Wednesday that it will cancel or modify all scheduled events for the next 30 days. Modifications include pre packaged options in dining halls and livestreams for events, like the Mr. and Miss VSU Pageant and student government activities. Christopher Newport University took a similar approach, by rerouting study abroad plans and limiting serve-served food, according to its website. 

A few colleges remain open at this time: Liberty, Regent, and Hampton universities, and Reynolds Community College.

Transmission electron microscopic image of an isolate from the first U.S. case of COVID-19, formerly known as 2019-nCoV. The spherical viral particles, colorized blue, contain cross-sections through the viral genome, seen as black dots. Photo from the Centers for Disease Control, used with permission.

As of Wednesday, there are 938 confirmed and presumed positive COVID-19 cases in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The bulk of cases are in Washington, California and New York. The infection has caused 29 deaths in the states. Worldwide, more than 118,300 people have the infection, including over 80,900 individuals living in mainland China. The outbreak has killed 4,292, reported the World Health Organization.

For more information about COVID-19 in Virginia, visit www.vdh.virginia.gov/coronavirus.

Written by Hannah Eason, Capital News Service. Top Photo via VCU-CNS

VCU Gets In Formation With Class on Beyoncé

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A class at Virginia Commonwealth University focusing on Beyoncé is exciting students to learn about the artist’s role in feminism, African American studies, and pop culture.

Following over 20 years of Beyoncé’s music prevailing in the nationwide music scene, VCU is hosting a new course focused on the artist in its African American studies department. 

Beyoncé Knowles-Carter has produced several number one songs on the Billboard Hot 100 in addition to critically-acclaimed albums, and has received multiple Grammys for her work. Her 2016 album Lemonade became a quick pop culture phenomenon not only musically, but visually — major publications lauded the album for its personal in-depth look into Beyoncé’s life that the artist had previously never shared with the masses. 

College instructors across the country now are intertwining the artist’s legacy into lectures and elective courses that students can take for credit toward their degrees. 

VCU got into formation, and currently hosts a course on the pop artist labeled “Beyoncé: Music, Race, Fame.” Taught by professor Madison Alexander Moore, the class focuses not just on Beyoncé’s history, but also the impact she has on her community. 

“It’s not necessarily a class about Beyoncé, but a class about stardom, virtuosity, and what it takes to be a pop star in the age of Instagram and internet connectivity,” Moore said.

PHOTO: Beyoncé on Instagram

Moore uses the work of a wide variety of black feminist scholars and critics in the class, ranging from Christina Sharpe’s exploration of blackness using the framework of a slave ship in her book In the Wake to bell hooks on black female sexuality. According to Moore, going into depth about Beyoncé’s influence in pop culture teaches students about black feminism and the history behind black female performances.

“I thought I would know everything because I’m a fan, but we learn a lot of stuff I didn’t even know we would touch on,” said VCU senior Kelsey Jones.

Jones — a self-proclaimed member of the “BeyHive,” described as Beyoncé’s devoted legion of fans — initially joined the class for an elective credit necessary to graduate. She didn’t realize how much she was going to enjoy the class or the professor until they started diving deeper.

“He got his degree from Yale; his personality is one of a kind, and he’s honestly so hip and kind,” Jones said. “Not to mention he is an African American male who researches and [is interested in] black queer studies.” 

Moore is no stranger to discussing artists and pop culture. He has written multiple articles for VICE, Out Magazine, and The Journal of Popular Music Studies. He also published his first book in 2018, titled Fabulous: The Rise of the Beautiful Eccentric, which goes in-depth about how the idea of fabulousness is used by marginalized groups as ways to cope with pain. Moore is currently writing two books, one being a cultural study on Beyoncé. 

PHOTO: Beyoncé on Facebook

The pop queen is known for her support of universities. In 2017, in honor of the one-year anniversary of her Peabody award-winning album Lemonade, Beyoncé announced the “Formation Scholars” scholarship. The scholarship  was awarded to four women “who are unafraid to think outside the box and are bold, creative, conscious and confident.” The four participating schools were Berklee College of Music, Howard University, Parsons School of Design, and Spelman College.

The following year, Beyoncé and her husband Shawn Carter (also known as Jay-Z) awarded 10 $100,000 scholarships to “exceptional senior high school students with financial needs.” 

Beyoncé also paid homage to historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) with her iconic Coachella performance in 2018. The performance, nicknamed “Beychella,” contained sorority and fraternity imagery, and featured bands and performers from selected HBCUs.

The film of this concert, Homecoming, was released April 17 on Netflix. In tandem, Beyoncé released behind-the-scenes footage from the event along with a surprise live album featuring two new recordings. When asked about Beyonce’s legacy, Moore matter-of-factly cited the uproar caused when that album was released.

“What other artist can drop an album at midnight and make the internet stop?”

Moore will teach “Beyoncé: Music, Race, Fame” again in the spring semester of 2020. Interested VCU students can find detailed info here.

Music Sponsored By Graduate Richmond

Legislators Continue to Address High Eviction Rates in Virginia

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One in ten Richmonders who rent faced eviction notices in 2016. We all know this is a problem, and Virginia’s legislators are searching for ways to fix it.

Scholars, lawyers and lawmakers are still grappling with high eviction rates in Virginia and how to enact solutions. A panel Thursday at Virginia Commonwealth University addressed the Eviction Lab at Princeton University’s findings that five cities in Virginia ranked in the top 10 for national eviction rates, including Richmond, Hampton, Newport News, Norfolk and Chesapeake.

The local eviction rates ranged from 11.4 percent in Richmond to 7.9 percent in Chesapeake. The rate represents the number of evictions per 100 rental homes in an area. 

About 150 people attended the event, which included three panelists: Six Points Innovation Center director Jackie Washington, Virginia Poverty Law Center attorney Phil Storey, and Sen. Jennifer McClellan, D-Richmond.  

From left: Sen. Jennifer McClellan, D-Richmond, Jackie Washington, Phil Storey, and moderator Megan Pauly at “Eviction Beyond the Numbers: Community Impacts and Policy Landscape of Housing Instability” (Photo by VCU CNS)

McClellan highlighted seven bills that passed the recent General Assembly session and were signed into law. The legislation included bills that made written leases required, reduced the number of eviction cases a landlord could file, created the opportunity for tenants to submit unpaid rent and fees prior to eviction, and allowed tenants to recover their possessions.

“This is not really a partisan issue,” McClellan said. “Where there is disagreement, it’s really sort of the landlords versus tenants, and I don’t mean to say that all landlords are bad or all landlords are predatory.” Of the seven housing laws signed by the governor last session, four were introduced by Democrats and three by Republicans.

McClellan also said in a phone interview after the event that more bills to address eviction, including a bill to address the habitability of a rental property, are in the drafting and planning stages now.   

Though legislators passed a flurry of bills last session to reform landlord and tenant laws, Storey said “way too many people are on the knife’s edge because of the way the system is designed.”

Much of the discussion at the panel held at VCU’s W.E. Singleton Center for the Performing Arts centered around how tenants fall behind on rent payments.  

“Two-thirds of the people who call our hotline are behind on rent, with the average caller being around two and a half months back,” Storey said. 

Storey also said that on average their clients are paying 58 percent of their monthly gross income to rent, with some paying as much as 70 percent.

Panelists also discussed the link between discriminatory housing policies and the eviction rate today, which according to the RVA Eviction Lab increases as the share of the African American population in a neighborhood increases. Washington highlighted historic redlining in Richmond’s Jackson Ward neighborhood, where banks would avoid making real estate investments based on neighborhood demographics, as “an intentionally racist housing policy.”

“If we don’t connect the dots from historic housing policy, then we just might miss it,” Washington said. “But those who experience it will never miss it. Folks of color will always know that it’s racist.”

Storey agreed, saying that “things that seem sort of natural and immutable are often not, and are based in some pretty ugly root causes.”  

Dr. Benjamin Teresa, co-director of the RVA Eviction Lab, introduced the panel “Eviction Beyond the Numbers: Community Impacts and Policy Landscape of Housing Instability” (Photo by VCU CNS)

The panel was sponsored by VCU’s L. Douglas Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs, VCU University College, and Virginia’s home for Public Media. The panelists were introduced by Benjamin Teresa and Kathryn Howell, co-directors of the RVA Eviction Lab at VCU, which opened this year and provides eviction data and research.  

“One of the goals of the lab is to do research that is relevant to Richmond and other cities in Virginia, as well as outside of the state,” Teresa said.

The panel was connected to this year’s VCU Common Book, a program that selects a new book each year for incoming freshmen. The initiative is intended to foster awareness and engagement around important issues.

Incoming freshmen received a copy of Evicted, a book by Matthew Desmond, the founder of the Eviction Lab at Princeton University. Freshman-level courses incorporate the book into coursework and discussion. Desmond is scheduled to visit VCU on Oct. 16.

Candidates from many Virginia House and Senate districts will have a chance to weigh in on evictions at a forum on Oct. 10. Candidates from 11 House districts and from six Senate districts have been invited to participate, though the list of confirmed attendees has not been released yet.

The event will be moderated by VPM and held at the Virginia Museum of History & Culture.

Written by Jason Boleman, Capital News Service. Top Photo: Attendees marked where they live on eviction maps of Richmond neighborhoods in the lobby of the W.E. Singleton Center for the Performing Arts. Photo via VCU CNS

Westboro Baptist Church Hurls Slurs Ahead of Richmond Visit

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Westboro Baptist Church is planning to visit Virginia Commonwealth University and the Virginia State Capitol on March 11, though it’s unclear how much access the group will have to university grounds.

The Westboro Baptist Church is infamous for its posters that feature slurs against the LGBTQ community and its practice of picketing soldiers’ funerals. The Southern Poverty Law Center calls the church “arguably the most obnoxious and rabid hate group in America.”

According to the VCU policies and events website, members of the public may use university property “only by invitation” from a university employee or student.

However, the public may reserve the Park Plaza amphitheater without an invitation “no more than five days in advance of the desired date of use.”

VCU prohibits expression that is not protected by law, such as obscenity and fighting words.

VCU officials tweeted that they are aware of the WBC’s plans to demonstrate “on City of Richmond public property, near campus.”

“While their views are antithetical to VCU’s core values of diversity and inclusion, their free speech — and ours — is a guaranteed constitutional right,” the tweet said.

A press release from Westboro Baptist Church for the State Capitol event includes hateful language toward Del. Danica Roem, D-Prince William, Virginia’s first transgender woman elected to the General Assembly.

Roem, who has inspired the LGBTQ community, said in a 2017 MSNBC interview: “You can champion inclusion, you can champion equality and equity and you can win.” She has also said that she wants the press to focus on her policies, not her gender.

She defeated 13-term incumbent Robert G. Marshall, who unsuccessfully sponsored legislation known widely as the “bathroom bill,” which would have required people to use the restroom that corresponded with the gender on their birth certificate.

When members of the Westboro Baptist Church visited Richmond in 2010, they encountered hundreds of counterprotesters. They visited the Virginia Holocaust Museum in Shockoe Bottom along with other Jewish cultural centers.

The group’s final stop during the 2010 visit was Hermitage High School on Hungary Spring Road in Henrico County, where church members faced hundreds of young counterdemonstrators. Westboro Baptist Church did not visit VCU that year, but students staged a silent anti-hate rally anyway.

By Rosemarie O’Connor, Capital News Service. Photos via Westboro Baptist Church’s website (unlinked on purpose, google it)

What Happens When A VCU Employee Calls Security On A Black Professor

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There’s been a recent, yet not new, trend in people calling the police on black. Whether it be for falling asleep in their own dorm, brushing their backpack up against a white woman in a store accidentally, waiting for a business meeting in Starbucks, or having a barbeque at the lake — black Americans have had the police called on them for many reasons.

The latest example: last week at Virginia Commonwealth University, an associate professor in the School of the Arts called campus security on artist and visiting professor Caitlin Cherry. 

Cherry was invited to teach a graduate critical theory seminar course and conduct graduate studio visits for painting and printmaking grad students during the fall semester. She commutes from New York to Richmond every two weeks to teach at VCU. Last week, she was beginning her day by sending out emails, sitting in the adjunct lounge of the Fine Arts Building. The room is code-access only, for faculty, administration, and graduate students.

As Cherry was working, an older, non-black gentleman entered the lounge. 

“I say hello and he sort of comes in, doesn’t do anything, doesn’t verbally acknowledge me and walks back out of the room,” Cherry said. 

Minutes later, campus security arrived to ask Cherry to show her VCU identification card. After providing it, Cherry began to absorb what had happened.

“I left the classroom to walk around, and I saw the same gentleman in a classroom. I realized he was a fellow painting and printmaking professor,” Cherry said. “I didn’t know his name, so I looked at him to make sure I could say who it was. I was going to send an email to the chair of my department and tell him what happened.”

Cherry sent an email to Painting and Printmaking Chair Noah Simblist, who apologized for the incident and said they would look into the matter.

After giving security the name of the man she thought made the call, Simblist confirmed it was associate professor Javier Tapia. The reason why Tapia, a Peruvian-born Associate Professor in VCU’s Painting & Printmaking Department, called campus security is still unknown at this point. Tapia did not respond to RVA Magazine’s requests for comment.

“If I didn’t have my ID on me at the time, it would have been possible that I would have been removed from my own classroom — or removed from the building until somebody identified me,” Cherry said.

“It’s a greater issue of what Javier Tapia had to have thought… To think that not only did I not belong in this locked classroom — but that I wasn’t even given the privilege of looking like a graduate student, or any student in the building. I think he was shocked to find out that I was a visiting professor.”

While Tapia is of Peruvian heritage, there is still a bigger racial issue of non-black people calling law enforcement on black people that must be dealt with. When George Zimmerman killed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin, many people tried to write off his act as racially motivated because Zimmerman is Hispanic. However, acts of oppression and anti-blackness can be perpetrated by anyone.

After posting about the incident on her Facebook, the response from students, other faculty and friends was swift. Many have e-mailed VCU Equity and Access about the occurrence, demanding that action be taken.

PHOTO: Caitlin Cherry, Facebook

“Later that morning, I started my studio visits and felt like I had to suck up a little bit to continue doing my grad student visits,” Cherry said. “Probably the saddest thing is that I had to walk past the man who called security to go to the bathroom, so there was a moment where I had to use the restroom, and I tried to hold it in so that I could avoid him.”

Cherry is taking this experience as an opportunity to not only foster a dialogue about racial tensions in the School of the Arts, but also put measures in place so that this doesn’t happen to any other professor or student. In a political climate hostile to many minority communities, this is an opportunity for a bigger conversation to take place about the power that other people feel over marginalized groups.

Entitlement over spaces and who can be in them is an issue that America needs to address: because it’s not new, and it’s getting black people killed. While it’s a more extreme version of these situations, the shooting of a black man, Botham Jean, in his own apartment in Dallas, Texas is a perfect example of power and entitlement. If someone can have such a strong sense of ownership that they can claim someone else’s home as their own, then kill them, where are black people safe?

“I think that’s why the response is so strong — not because of what could have happened,” Cherry said, “but the fact that there is anxiety around people in positions of power feeling possessive of spaces that they feel are theirs.”

An email was sent out internally by VCUArts Dean Shawn Brixey informing VCUarts students and staff about the situation at hand. It read:

“In light of a recent event involving individuals in one of our departments, which was reported to the School of the Arts administration on Thursday, October 25, we have asked VCU Equity and Access Services to conduct an inquiry into the matter.”

Cherry is making her formal complaint this week with VCU Administration, and says that both the Chair of Painting and Printmaking and the VCUArts Dean have been supportive.

Top image by Jeff Auth at English Wikipedia, CC by 3.0/via Wikimedia

Editor’s Note: This article has been updated to reflect new information regarding the race of the VCU professor in question. 

VCU Arts Adjuncts Rally For Fair Pay Outside Cabell Library

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In a demonstration of communal solidarity, nearly 80 members of the VCU School of the Arts (VCUarts) community gathered in front of VCU’s Cabell Library Friday morning in support of fair pay for adjunct professors.

The ‘Adjunct Fair Pay Rally’ was organized after over 1,400 people signed a petition in support of the cause, demanding that adjuncts be paid at least $2,000 per credit hour, or over double what they are paid now.

Adjunct speaks at Fair Pay Rally

“There are some adjuncts right now who are one emergency away from being homeless,” said Heide Trepanier, 48, former art adjunct in the Department of Paint and Printmaking.

The majority of rally attendees were students. According to Trepanier and a recording of a meeting with VCUarts chair people, legal counsel advised that adjunct professors who canceled their Friday morning classes to be at the rally or brought their students to the rally should be fired.

“I think with student involvement, more people can know about it and the cause can spread throughout the university quicker than if it was just adjunct faculty talking about it,” Eric Eckhart said, a VCUarts freshman. “I feel like if adjuncts feel comfortable knowing they can survive in Richmond, then they are far more capable to teach the classes that they have been given to teach.”

Eric Eckhart, VCU freshman

As of now, adjunct professors at VCU earn less than half of the average rent cost in Richmond per month. Currently around 120 adjuncts in the School of Arts teach over 60 percent of all classes in what is ranked as the number one public arts school in the country, each earning between $750 and $900 per credit hour without benefits. Since the number of classes an adjunct may teach is capped at two or three per semester, their yearly wages are around $15,000, or just above the federal poverty line, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

“You’ve got adjuncts who in order to survive are working at two and three different colleges,” Trepanier said. “They’re worn out, they’re tired, they’re broke, and you want to give your students the best education possible, but you can’t necessarily do that if you don’t have the resources to get the materials that you need, or the time to research to give a quality lecture to your students.”

A group of VCUarts adjuncts formed the organization, “VCUarts Adjuncts Organizing for Fair Pay” and sent letters with their demands to VCU President Michael Rao’s office, as well as to VCUarts Dean Shawn Brixey.

“Adjunct faculty currently account for the majority of instructors in the VCUarts departments, yet are still paid significantly lower than other top-rated public universities in Virginia,” the letter to Rao stated. “The University is sending a clear message to us, and the public about the value of its educators by underpaying adjuncts despite consistently increasing tuition.”

In response, Rao cited shortfalls in the budget as to why the minimum salary for adjuncts would be raised only to $1,000 per credit hour. According to Trepanier, Brixey stated in a meeting with adjuncts that to raise wages, student tuition must to rise. In a separate meeting between VCUarts legal counsel and chairpeople, it was suggested adjunct wage raises would have to come out of full-time faculty’s research budget.

“There are departments who spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on equipment they don’t use,” Trepanier said. “If they just had some oversight and they just lowered the amount of administration, VCU could pay a decent wage to their faculty.”

The imbalance between adjunct and full-time faculty affects multiple schools within VCU, including the Robertson School of Media and Culture, who recently found issue with their faculty ratio after undergoing the re-accreditation process.

University accreditation is the official process by which universities and colleges are recognized as being qualified to grant degrees. Robertson school recently took part in the voluntary process to become re-accredited by the Accrediting Council on Education in Journalism and Mass Communications (ACEJMC).

ACEJMC has nine accrediting standards, only two of which Robertson school did not fulfill at the time of the site visit, in which professional representatives from ACEJMC visited Robertson school to conduct an examination after Robertson’s detailed, 300-page self-evaluation. The school has several months to correct any issues before accreditation is granted or denied, one of which is having over 50 percent of all classes at Robertson taught by adjunct professors.

“There are limited resources for higher education,” said Hong Chen, professor, and Robertson School director. “Then the university probably does not have enough funding for full-time faculty professors. After the site visit, the university immediately worked together to provide new faculty positions for us.”

According to Chen, Rao created room in VCU’s budget to provide extra full-time positions in Robertson after a private meeting with representatives from ACEJMC. Tim Bajkiewicz, professor and Robertson School associate director, also noted that historically, ensuring funds for a large number of full-time faculty is a struggle for all universities.

VCUarts has a similar requirement within their accreditation process with the National Association of Schools of Art and Design (NASAD), but is not scheduled to have another comprehensive review until 2025, according to the NASAD database.

“The artists that teach absolutely love teaching, but the arts don’t bring in any money,” Trepanier said. “Sometimes the only money [artists] are making per year is this adjunct money… So when they don’t pay their faculty a decent living wage, what they’re doing is starving them out of these positions.”

Trepanier also observed that unless VCU is able to increase adjunct pay and faculty ratio, VCUarts could lose their high ranking as U.S. News and World Report is likely to begin including adjunct pay rates into their ranking standards

“A good school can’t pay their teachers less than poverty wages and offer their students a good education,” Trepanier said.