U has botched its vaccine mandate

With less than a month to go before the start of a new academic year, faculty, students and staff at the University of Minnesota are bracing themselves for fall semester. As faculty, we should be dedicating our full energies to preparations for a new term. However, our university administration's mismanagement of the return to campus has left faculty and staff scrambling to figure out how to keep ourselves, our students and our families safe as the delta coronavirus variant spreads.

We are eager to get back into our classrooms and are dismayed that university administrators have jeopardized a safe return to campus by dragging their heels on needed public health measures, notably the long-delayed vaccination mandate.

This mandate was not issued until Aug. 9 and is conditional on FDA approval of vaccines for general use. Because it is unclear when FDA approval will occur, and because development of immunity takes weeks after vaccination, this measure alone will not mitigate the risk of severe illness due to COVID transmission until well into the fall semester.

The consequences of delay, the conditional nature of the vaccination mandate and the administration's refusal to take prudent steps to limit the number of students in classrooms has unfortunately set the stage for our class meetings to become super-spreader events. A temporary mask mandate was issued Aug. 2, which may or may not be extended to the first day of classes, and the administration's current plan for resuming in-person teaching means that there will be many large classes with students sitting shoulder-to-shoulder in classrooms with ventilation of unknown and untested quality.

Faculty concerned that ventilation in their classrooms may be inadequate have been told to seek out that information by themselves, obtain air purifiers themselves, and carry them to class to improve ventilation.

Those concerned about exposing their children or immunocompromised family members to the virus, consequent of in-class transmission, have been told to get fitted with N95 masks and to seek mental health counseling.

The problem is thus compounded by uneven staffing and funding since departments, not colleges or the central administration, are made responsible for obtaining protective equipment. Setting aside the cost and trouble these measures entail, and the absurdity of recommending counseling as a cure for COVID, the idea that it is necessary to fit tens of thousands of faculty, staff and students with respirators in order to interact safely on campus is hardly reassuring.

For faculty, the only exceptions being made are for individuals who can document a medical condition that renders them especially vulnerable to COVID, and the burden of establishing this must be borne by the faculty member. No similar accommodations are available for students. The administration has refused to recognize that individuals must also care for others, in particular immunocompromised relatives and schoolchildren.

Since our university's administration has abdicated its responsibility to provide a safe working environment, it must provide both faculty and students more flexibility in the mode of instruction. Faculty who do not wish to teach in super-spreader classrooms should be allowed to choose their teaching modality. Students should not be required to learn in super-spreader classrooms either. And staff should not be required to bear the risks of in-person transmission. Having a robust set of online options is especially important for students who are immunocompromised or have vulnerable family members.

We all feel the desire to return to normal. Despite the risks COVID continues to present, faculty are eager for in-person interaction with our students, the lifeblood of education and research.

Desire and hope must not, however, override the imperative to act responsibly and humanely.