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MCC Daily Tribune Archive

President's Wednesday Message


One of the goals of this blog is to give you a sense of what I'm thinking about, reading, doing -- and why. So, in light of recent stormy days and the winter of snow storms to come, I thought I'd share a "behind the scenes" look at how we decide to close the college.

As you might guess, hurricanes and tropical storms are not new to me -- nor is making recommendations on when to shut down. Canceling classes is never an easy decision because of a central tenet of the work we do: attending class is key to student success. The threshold of when to even consider closing is a pretty high one. So, over time, I've developed a fairly robust and sturdy checklist to guide the decision. But my rubric likely looks a bit different from the one at Brockport or RIT or Nazareth. Why? It foregrounds a simple fact: we're a community college. 

What does that mean?  Well, it means that we need to remember some key demographic characteristics of our students that distinguish them from their four-year college and university peers.  Namely,

- They commute, frequently using public transportation.
- They often have primary care-taking duties for children, grandchildren and/or siblings.
- They usually don't have the social or financial capital to make alternate arrangements for childcare, to pay others for storm related clean-up, or to arrange for alternate transportation.
- They often live in places more immediately impacted by flooding, power outages, and the like; and subsequently, these neighborhoods may also see delays in clean-up and restoration of services.

With that in mind, here are some of the questions I ask, in no particular order:

- Is there a declared state of emergency?
- Does it include travel restrictions?
- Is travel likely to be hazardous regardless of restrictions?
- What is the condition of the main routes to the campus/es?
- Will public transportation be running? If so, for how long?
- Are there power outages impacting the college? Our students and faculty? What can emergency management share about the time to restoration?
- Have the public schools closed? All or just a handful?
- Has the college experienced facilities damage?
- What time is it? Will we have a sufficient window to empty the campus before a weather event or is it better to shelter in place? Will students/faculty/staff have sufficient time to make alternate arrangements for family responsibilities if the college stays open or reopens?
- Will we get enough folks at the college to justify staying open or reopening?
- How stressful is this situation for our students, faculty and staff?

This last question is key because while it’s not all that hard to make people show up, it might be impossible to get them to focus on the task at hand once they’re there. Can a faculty member be effective if she’s worrying about whether her homeowner’s insurance will cover the tree that demolished her neighbor’s car or he’s thinking about whether the generator at his mother’s long term care facility will hold up? Can a student stay engaged if she’s worried about where she had to leave her child or how she’ll make it back across town to pick her baby up? Probably not.

For Hurricane Sandy, the answer to this last question was the tipping point. In Florida, hurricanes are too frequent to be truly anxiety producing for most. They are the equivalent of snow storms in the North: the weather version of “what else is new.” But, if it snows a half inch in the South, whoa! Every transformer pops, every car rear ends the one in front, and every pipe bursts. Time to call it a day. A huge, swirling hurricane is going to hit Rochester? It’s all over.

So, this is why you had off Tuesday. Hope your yard is cleared, your candles re-stocked, and your emails are all caught up. It’s back to normal this morning!

What are your thoughts on emergencies and campus closing? Share them on the blog: https://www.monroecc.edu/blogs/ .

Anne M. Kress
President's Office
10/31/2012