Friday’s faculty conference at Winthrop University covered an array of topics, some of which had been the subject of much discussion among students.
Political science professor Adolphus Belk Jr. opened the conference by recognizing Winthrop board of trustees member Jane LaRoche being in attendance which drew enthusiastic applause. Belk also took a moment at the opening of the conference to note the passing of former Winthrop faculty member Stevie Chepko who Belk said passed away at the beginning of the month, adding that she had helped students throughout her career.
Winthrop Provost Adrienne McCormick spoke next and said that she was there to “share a lot of key activity updates in terms of what’s happening in the provost’s office.”
McCormick said that Jamie Cooper will start as Winthrop’s “new vice provost for student success and dean of university college on April 6.”
“I’m very excited about that progress point,” McCormick said. “He’s going to be a really great resource as we think about moving forward with our student success initiatives.”
A math professor at Winthrop asked McCormick if there is “institutional planning” underway regarding the threat that the coronavirus/COVID-19 could potentially pose to the university and how the university plans to relay the information to students, faculty and staff.
McCormick said that the “critical incident management team” had plans to hold a meeting this week to discuss the subject.
“We’ve already had a lot of conversations behind the scenes,” McCormick said, adding that the university has been in contact with students who are travelling abroad as well as students who are planning to study abroad. She said that they have been “updating” those students and their families “relative to threat levels in those areas.”
“We’re putting in place [a] contingency plan should there be any reported cases in South Carolina — there currently are none — but we don’t know where this is going. So yes, we will have more of a plan that [will] be fully communicated out after the team meets next week,” McCormick said.
Vice President for Student Affairs Shelia Higgs Burkhalter addressed the conference to talk about what was happening around campus “relative to student affairs.” Burkhalter said there is “a lot of decision-making happening” in regards to on-campus issues, including weather and illnesses.
“There is no one person — especially not me — sitting in a back room making decisions about weather events,” Burkhalter said. “There are a variety of people who are involved in the decision-making that happens with this.”
Burkhalter said that in events of inclement or threatening weather, someone from the Winthrop University Police Department works with local emergency operations while Burkhalter herself is “usually in communication with that person as well as emergency operations for the state of South Carolina.”
Burkhalter said that the university has access to “interesting” doppler radar which is used to track storms and help predict where the storms are going. Burkhalter said that people from various parts of the university look at available information in regards to threatening or inclement weather and work together to “make a good, sound decision.”
“On the day of the tornado, I was actually out in that storm…having conversations about what the weather was doing in real-time with all those various players to make a decision about what would happen,” Burkhalter said. “Of course there were several people unhappy we didn’t shut things down but if you paid attention to the weather that day, everything calmed down about five o’clock in the afternoon and then there was nothing else for the rest of that day.”
Burkhalter also addressed the recent case of mumps that the campus was made aware of.
“What I need for you to understand is that we have to work with DHEC when it comes to these kinds of issues. Our first concern is to isolate whatever the issue is when it’s something like mumps. We want to check to make sure that individual or individuals involved has had the appropriate level of vaccinations and this instance, I can tell you that they did. This still happened, though,” Burkhalter said.
Burkhalter said that the search for a new chief and assistant chief for WUPD will be “going to a national search a little bit later this semester.” She said that committees related to that search have not yet been formed but that the job descriptions for the positions are being rewritten, adding that “we don’t want to rush the process.”
“When you have leadership that leaves in that manner, you have an opportunity to really think about ‘what’s the appropriate structure? How should those positions be structured? What are the things that you’re looking for?’” Burkhalter said. “So we want to be very mindful of that.”
Burkhalter has said that during her time at Winthrop, WUPD has had “a bit of a revolving door” and that it has been “difficult to keep things staffed up” but said the department is well-staffed right now.
She mentioned the new WUPD patrol cars and said that the department was “way past due” for new cars. “The state finally said ‘we have to have the leased vehicles back, you’ve driven them for far too long,’” Burkhalter said.
She said that “some students thought” that WUPD was utilizing unmarked cars due to members of the department driving around campus in cars that had no markings or visible mounted lights. She said that it falls on the university to install lights and apply markings which can take a while, adding that they use some of the materials from the old cars and install them on the new cars “so that it does not cost tens of thousands of dollars to upfit the new vehicles.”
Towards the end of the conference, four resolutions that were to be voted on were put on the projector screen. History professor Ginger Williams said that if the four requests were voted in favor of then Belk — who serves as faculty representative to the board of trustees — would take them to the board.
According to an email provided to The Johnsonain, the four requests are as follows: “We request that the Faculty Representative to the Board of Trustees deliver oral reports in addition to written reports. We request that, whenever possible, the Board of Trustees hold board meetings at Winthrop University, so that the Faculty and Student representatives to the Board of Trustees, as well as faulty, staff and Winthrop community members can easily attend. We request that the Faculty Representative to the Board of Trustees be a member of the Search Committee for the next President of Winthrop University, as well as the Search Committees for all future executive officers of Winthrop University. We request that, whenever possible and appropriate, the Board of Trustees invite the Faculty Representative to the Board of Trustees to participate in Executive Sessions of the Board of Trustees.”
Prior to the vote, Belk said these resolutions were about the position of the faculty representative to the board which he said was bigger than any one person. He addressed the “current environment” and how some the board members “might feel under attack.”
“As I included in my report, there [were] the conversations [about what is] happening with this petition and this resolution over here and some things,” Belk said. “Some students were really ticked off about some processes and so you might feel a bit on edge if something else comes along. There’s no controversy here and I don’t think these are big asks even in a moment where tensions are high and nerves might be raw.”
All four resolutions were advanced with no opposing votes.
Photo: Olivia Esselman/ The Johnsonian
