Matt Harmon:
On this episode of Monmouth weekly, we talked with university president Patrick Lehe about the recent decision for the university to teach remotely for the remaining part of the 2020 spring semester and how this impacts the student population. This is Matt Harmon, it's episode two of Monmouth weekly. Thanks for joining us.

Matt Harmon:
The date is Wednesday, March 25th. It is episode number two of mammoth weekly. I'm Matt Horman member of the communication department, faculty on campus in west long branch, and happy to be joined again by president Patrick Lehe, who is good enough to give us some time here in the topsy turvy world of the coronavirus and everything that is taking place, not just Monmouth, but worldwide, uh, president Lehe wish you a very good morning. And, um, I, I think today we could spend some time really looking at a little bit more of the specific focus of how this is impacting the student population, uh, with the idea that yesterday, uh, Monmouth making the announcement that the remaining part of the semester will be remote. I know a decision that for you probably extremely difficult and also a decision that doesn't just come from you, although you are the one leading, uh, the decision making process. This is something that there is a huge collaboration that takes place between you and several other parties.

Patrick Leahy:
Well, good morning, Matt. And again, thank you for this great idea to, to have these, uh, conversations where we can unpack things going on at Monmouth. Yeah, we had to make the decision yesterday. An announcement went out that we made the, uh, the, uh, commitment to going to remote instruction and learning for the entire semester. Uh, you'll recall that we, we had, uh, plan to do that at least for three weeks. And we just decided that given all the information we can collect from public health officials, given the, uh, governor's most recent executive order, that when you put those two things together, there's just little, little chance that we're gonna be able to gather together as a campus community here on campus between now and, and the end of the semester. So we went ahead and made the decision to commit to remote instruction for the, for the whole year.

Patrick Leahy:
There are a lot of people involved in a, a decision like that. I mean, first we take it to our crisis management team here on campus, which is a cross-functional team of individuals who help lead the, the university through as, as you might think, crisis situations. Um, we had the unanimous recommendation from them to make this move. Then of course, I took it to the university cabinet, which is an expanded group of people since I arrived to include seven deans, as well as the vice presidents, it was the unanimous recommendation of that group. And then one last thing I did is I didn't need to get permission from our board of trustees. They allow us to run the university, but I did have a conversation at length with our full board yesterday to share with them our thinking and they unanimously supported it. So, um, I feel positive that we, uh, took the soundings of all the people we needed to. I spoke to the faculty leadership, spoke to the president of the student government, as I typically do, spoke to the, uh, chair of our staff council. And, uh, it was unanimous across the campus that we need to make this move and to settle in for the next six weeks and focus on delivering high quality remote instruction to our students,

Matt Harmon:
President LA, he, when you think of it, you know, you, you mentioned all the people that you kind of talk to and I'm sure bounce ideas off of. So this is not just independent of you saying, okay, we're gonna be remote for the remaining part of the time. Wh what role, if any, does the state of New Jersey play in this? I mean, O obviously governor Murphy is, um, giving directive to the, the population here in the garden state, but is it something that you reach out to somebody government wise and say, this is what we're doing, or because Monmouth is a private institution. Um, we're, we're, we're independent to kind of make those decisions on our own.

Patrick Leahy:
Yeah. Very, very good question. Um, I'll reiterate something. I think I said at our last conversation that I am not a public health official, and we don't have anybody on campus who can really claim that mantle. So we work very closely with county health officials, state health officials, and officials, and of course, federal guidelines as well. The state in particular has been very aggressive on this as you well know. And, um, I, you know, I, I applaud the governor for taking these measures. I recognize there's gonna be a long term economic impact here, which is gonna hurt all of us one way or another, but lives are really at stake. And so they've been very aggressive and doesn't even require us to reach out to them because they're reaching out to us so regularly, uh, not only the public institutions, but the private institutions as well are under this executive order to make sure we move to remote instruction and thin out the campus as much as possible. So we're in touch with them constantly, um, to secretary, uh, for higher education in the state, uh, is, uh, a close contact at becoming a, a, uh, good collaborator and friend to Monmouth university. And, uh, we, we get our direction from her as well. So, uh, we really are very sensitive to what the public health officials are telling us because they obviously have expertise that we don't have, and they have access to information that we don't have. So that's where our primary influence is coming from

Matt Harmon:
On the Monmouth website, you posted, uh, the latest information, mom.edu under the coronavirus disease, 2019 links, seven things kind of bullet pointed in your announcement yesterday to I'll say the campus community. But, but I, I think the idea today, we wanted to look at it from more of a student perspective because there is certainly a lot of angst. You've got students that are looking to graduate. You've got students that are looking to move on from Monmouth after their four or five, however many years they've been here. There's, there's a lot of pieces to this puzzle. And, and if, if we could look at all, I'll say seven of these ideas and then take it in whatever direction we want. Um, some of the things in your last answer that you threw in there were trying to get the campus in essence vacated, which it has been because Monmouth was on spring break, but as students left, um, that Tuesday where class was originally canceled before spring break, nobody took all of their stuff out of their residence hall. So right now that's something that the university is going through that, that move out process. If students can do it, uh, it's not anything where mammo is giving a hard deadline, get your stuff out because right, in some cases, I'm sure students don't even have the, the capability to get the campus right now,

Patrick Leahy:
Right? It's one of our high priorities right now. Uh, of course, ensuring that we are delivering on our promises on remote instruction and learning is of course our highest priority, uh, beyond the health of, and safety of everyone. But soon after that, our big priority in the immediate term now is how to manage a move out process. Now, I should be clear here, Matt, that, you know, if we have 1800 students who typically live in our residence halls or in university owned housing, we're, we're down now to only about 65 who remain living on campus and they will remain because we've made it clear that if this really is your home, then you're welcome here. Of course. I mean, if, if you're a graduate student and this is your home and your family's here, of course you can stay. If you're an undergraduate where being at Monmouth is a safer situation, frankly, than, than being wherever your home is that, then you're welcome here.

Patrick Leahy:
If you're an international student who still can't get home, because the flights aren't lining up or whatever, then you're welcome here. So it's not those 65 people. It is all the other residential students who have belongings still in their rooms. That, of course, at some point they're gonna want to have access to given that we've made the decision to go remote the entire semester. We have to manage that very, very carefully Matt, because we wanna make sure that we're complying with both the letter and the spirit of the governor's executive order, which has us staying at home to, to the extent possible. So what we've decided simply is we'll go out to the families. We'll tell them that their belongings are safe. We'll lock, keep the rooms locked. If you, if, if you want, we encourage you just to come back to campus when this executive order is lifted and you can pick up your stuff if you really need it between now. And then we, we do have a very regimented schedule that we have put in place to ensure that we're abiding by all the, uh, social distancing guidelines. And, uh, the res life folks are working overtime to put that plan in place. And they'll be reaching out to students today, in fact, uh, to walk them through the different options so that they, um, are really comfortable that their, either their belongings are safe in place, or if they do feel like they have to come get them, there's a very orderly way in which to do so.

Matt Harmon:
You know, as we started episode one last week, and now episode two, I've said both times member of the department of communication on campus. So as a faculty member, I'm dealing just like anybody else is from the faculty side, from the student side, in terms of, of making this transition into remote learning. A couple of my classes are hybrid classes. So I, that transition has been easy, but I think probably for students who are trying to figure out this process, one of the things that's concerning is, well, how am I gonna get a grade? I know that between the provost, the faculty council yourself, um, there's a little bit of flexibility that that is, I would think in a way unprecedented where you can still get a letter grade, but you can also choose to just get a pass, fail option, um, as well, during the course of this spring 20, 20 semester, can you walk us through the, the process of what the grading situation will be for the remaining part of the semester?

Patrick Leahy:
Yeah. We had a lot of questions about this. Uh, the moment we, uh, announced we were going to remote instruction even a couple weeks ago. And in fact, a student petition came to me with, I think, close to a thousand signatures requesting a pass fail option. So we were already thinking about it, Matt, and, and having dialogue across the faculty. Um, here, here's what we discovered. Some students cannot go to pass fail because they're in certain courses where the accrediting body won't allow a pass fail grade. If you want the credit, you need to demonstrate a letter grade as part of that course. So that took care of some of the students. Other students did not want a pass fail option because they're running the table on their GPA. And they're like, well, why should I, if I, I know I'm gonna continue to do well, and I already have A's and B's why wouldn't, I want to continue to, to, uh, achieve those marks and have it aid my grade point average.

Patrick Leahy:
And then of course there were a whole host of students that thought, given this, uh, abrupt change in learning, uh, delivery, would it be more beneficial to them to have the flexibility to go to pass fail? So with that quandary, we took it to our faculty council. And I have to tell you, they did remarkable work coming up with, as you say, one of the most innovative grading policies I've heard of through this process. And that is that students will continue to do their work online to the best of their ability, continuing to collaborate with their faculty members along the way they will. In fact, at the end of the semester, obtain a letter grade, but then students get, I think it's three days upon receiving their grades. They get three days to decide which if any of the courses they would rather shift to pass fail. So let me just suggest if you got four A's and a C, you might decide, you know, what, I'll take the four A's and I want the pass fail with the, with the course in which I received the C and that still preserves full credit for the students. It's just that, that pass fail won't, uh, negatively affect the grade point average. It is as about as flexible a policy that we thought we could design for students. And I think so far the feedback from them has been very positive.

Matt Harmon:
And I like the idea that obviously the students will have that opportunity to, to think about it towards the end of the semester. Oh, I'm, I'm on that verge of, you know, I haven't been able, I haven't been able to really devote the time that I would've, or maybe just struggling technology wise pass fail, and, and from what I did read about it, and I know there'll be more information for, for students in, in different, uh, correspondence with, and from the university that if they chose the pass fail option, it, it neither hurts nor helps their GPA. It's essentially just getting the credit for the

Patrick Leahy:
Class, right? Uh, that's my understanding as well. You look, we need to get the credit. You need to keep stacking up those credits in order to continue on, on path to graduation. But, um, it won't affect your, your grade point average. It's very flexible. And I think addresses all of the concerns that our students have, the varying concerns that they have about this. Here's my worry, Matt is I don't want the students to get comfortable with it because after this spring semester, we're going back to the, the old way of grading <laugh>. So I don't, I don't want there to become too much of an affection for it because I don't think it's something we're gonna be able to continue, uh, into the, the future

Matt Harmon:
Episode. Number two of Monmouth, weekly, president Patrick Lehe, joining us here, uh, via remote, practicing our social distancing. He is at his residence. I am at mine. We are, uh, being able to talk to one another via technology. You spoke president Lehe about getting back to normal. After this spring 2020 semester leads me perfectly into my next point. Registration coming up for the fall summer classes right now are open for registration. And in terms of the university, uh, vantage point, right now, those should continue as normal, correct?

Patrick Leahy:
At least for now there's, there's two parts of the summer. I I'd like to, to mention Matt, if I may, the, the first is, and maybe you were gonna get to this. So forgive me if I'm jumping ahead. But, um, we have decided at this point that any faculty led international study programs are in fact canceled. We just decided that even though that that is a few months away, all the evidence suggests that it would not be responsible responsible of us right now to start booking flights and booking hotels and, and booking, uh, tours with tour operators at this point supported yesterday by the announcement that even the Olympic games is gonna get postponed for a year. And, you know, uh, all kinds of significant international events are being postponed until we get a better sense on the, uh, trajectory of this, of this virus.

Patrick Leahy:
So we went ahead and canceled those international trips, but what to your point, what we did not cancel in any way at this point is our summer course programming. As you know, we have a robust and increasingly robust summer academic schedule, which we think is very student centered because it gives students an opportunity to either get ahead in their coursework or to catch up in her coursework. And, uh, at this point we have, we have declared again in conversation with faculty leadership that for now the summer program is ago. You should register for courses just as you would otherwise. It still buys us a little bit of time, Matt, to see how this pandemic unfolds. We may convert more of those programs to remote learning. Like we had to do this spring semester, but we don't feel like we have to make that decision for a few more weeks. So, uh, the summer programs are a go and encourage students to consider them carefully and sign up as normal.

Matt Harmon:
There is obviously a pretty large financial, uh, consideration for students. Um, and we can break this down into a couple of different things. Let's start with students who financial aid wise rely on, on campus work in order to make, make ends mean from during the course of the semester. Um, reading here, the announcement that is on the Monmouth website is that that on campus work will, uh, be paid for the remaining part of the semester. Am I reading that correct?

Patrick Leahy:
You are. And, and I hope that, uh, that, that people understand that fully. The, the general sense is if you had a job on campus where Monmouth university was your part-time employer, if you will, that we will commit to those resources to the students. Uh, this includes graduate. Assistanceships where that's of course, tied into their tuition, remission and so forth. It includes federal work study mat, which is an important part of the way in which students package their financial aid. And it includes even students who are working on campus to earn a little bit of extra money. Now, in all of those cases, we will ask those students to do some work that contributes to our mission remotely, the way you and I are working right now, we'll ask them to work remotely. Uh, we'll try to get, uh, productivity out of them, but because this is so such an important part of our students, financial situation, we wanted to just make that commitment that over the next, whatever it is, six weeks, uh, those jobs are safe. And, um, I hope that the students appreciate the commitment on the university's behalf. The important thing here is to make sure that if you have on campus work, that you are in touch with your on campus supervisor, uh, and talk through with that person, uh, any of the, um, you know, complexities around this

Matt Harmon:
Reading also about the refund policy and, and listen in today's day and age, especially as a private university, um, at the end of the day dollars and cents do count, but the board of trustees approving a policy, students will get a prorated refund. Uh, if you lived on campus meal plans, parking fees, um, that probably something that, that you, you and the board and the leadership group spent a lot of time talking about. And I know from a student perspective, it will probably make people feel very comfortable knowing that mom is, is in essence, supporting the students back from a financial standpoint.

Patrick Leahy:
I hope they feel that way, Matt. I mean, this is a significant financial hit to the university, um, to, to make this, uh, declaration and to do it as quickly as we have. Um, we just felt as a senior administrative team, that, of course, it's the right thing to do. Um, if you're not using, uh, you know, your room, if you're not using your meal plan, then we wanna make sure that you have a chance to get that money back, either as a refund or a credit to future Monmouth expenses. Those details have not been worked out yet and, uh, need a little bit more time to work, work out those details. But the other thing, this signals and I, and I hope it's, again, not lost on folks is how, uh, relatively financially sound the university is that we can even afford to do this because, uh, I think there are some other institutions that haven't been, um, for good reason have not been as forthright as we're trying to be that one way or another. We will prorate the refunds, uh, for students who are not using these services.

Matt Harmon:
Do you just teased, I think right there a, uh, future episode of Monmouth weekly, you know, as you and I have spent some considerable time talking about what we wanna accomplish in each one of these, um, coming up, we'll, we'll look at things as we're looking at it today, from a student standpoint, we'll look at it from a faculty standpoint. Um, and certainly the financial standpoint from the university will be something that we'll be able to break down, uh, later on, you're getting very used to this broadcasting type thing. It's, it's extremely impressive.

Patrick Leahy:
Thank you. Thank you. And I do look forward to those future episodes. I mean, there's a limitless supply of things about which we could, uh, we could talk,

Matt Harmon:
Tell me a little bit, uh, from the financial standpoint as well, um, looking at your letter to the Monmouth university, to community about the president's relief fund, um, something that, again, from a student standpoint, there, there might be. And I say might because obviously if, if every student filed for some sort of appeal, it, it wouldn't go through, but there is an opportunity for students that really need the help, uh, through the president's relief fund,

Patrick Leahy:
We felt this was the missing piece. Uh, Matt, you know, if we had decided that we would commit in some way or another to the, to the room and board refunds, if we are committing to students who are, uh, working on campus, I mean, those are two big commitments. We hope right there, but I felt there was a missing piece. And that is the emails that I was receiving over the course of the past couple weeks with students in real dire situations. I mean, I won't go into the, the, the details less, uh, um, you, I wanna preserve the, the confidentiality, but students who, um, are in real, real tough spot, parents have lost their jobs. They don't know how they're gonna pay the rent, or they don't know how they're going to eat, or they have never had to buy internet access before. And I just wanted a way for those students to know that if you have nowhere else to turn, I want you to turn to your university for the possibility that we might be able to help you.

Patrick Leahy:
And I'm so careful as you pointed out, Matt, I'm so careful in overcom committing because you know, resources are limited. Um, I can't accommodate every request that, uh, is bound to come in, but at least I wanna know about it because there might be ways that the university could be helpful. We have a small fund already established from the generosity of donors over the years that has basically been given to the president and said, this is a president's discretionary fund. Well, I'm turning that fund into the relief fund, basically because I can't think of a better way than to, to leak money to people. If it might be helpful in bailing them out of this very difficult, difficult time. So the, the grants I'm afraid are gonna have to be small, um, smaller grants. Uh, but I wanna know about it cuz I can't help people.

Patrick Leahy:
Can't I can't deal with problems. We always say around here, I can't deal with problems that we don't know about. So if we know about it and this relief fund gives us a, a, a mechanism through which we can identify challenges, we can either put some money that we have at play, or we can identify that problem and say, oh, you know what? You need to be talking to this person or that person, because there might be ways we could assist your challenges, uh, in those other areas. So I'm really proud of this. I mean, we, we launched it yesterday. I think we already would you believe in the first few hours, I think we have 170 requests. Now, some of them I'll be honest or not, not very legitimate. I mean, <laugh>, you know, in a future episode, I'll, I'll read you some of the requests we're getting, but uh, some of them would just, uh, tear your heart out when you, when you hear about them. And, and we want to try to separate out the legitimate requests from the, shall we say, illegitimate ones and do everything we can to try to be, uh, to be helpful. I've got one of our top people at this university, Amanda Claus, who's our executive director of alumni relations and annual giving running this program for us. And, um, I'm very excited about it. Uh, and, uh, hopefully we will be able to continue to collect more requests and just do the very best we can and try to satisfy. Some of them

Matt Harmon:
Love the idea, obviously as a, a mammoth graduate, uh, undergrad and masters that the university continues to try and be proactive with students and the mammoth community instead of reactive president Patrick Lehe joining us here on Monmouth weekly. This is our second episode, uh, president Lehe, let's finish with a couple of things. One of the highlights, obviously of each and every academic year takes place right in the middle part of may. It is commencement. And obviously this year, um, the, the may date has been postponed and I'll say T B D could be the summer could be at another point in time, somewhere in the future. Uh, but I know in, in, in talking with you even off air, that the university is fully committed to those that should be graduating in may that at some point you will be able to be, be part of a normal type commencement graduation ceremony.

Patrick Leahy:
Yes. And the important word, is there a normal type ceremony? I mean, I've heard other places say, oh, we'll throw a party for you or whatever. And that is not what we have in mind. We have in mind moving the traditional in person, commencement ceremony from mid-May, cuz it's not likely to, to happen then back sometime in the summer to June or July or August. I, whenever the spring semester finishes and public health officials declare it's safe for us to host a ceremony like that. We will host the ceremony like that. We just feel that it is the right thing to do for our graduates and their families. Incidentally. I mean, I always say commencement ceremonies are in many respects as much about the families as they are the students themselves. We will host that. That is an important part of who we are. We're not doing a virtual ceremony.

Patrick Leahy:
We're not gonna try look, we're we're, we're doing a traditional ceremony celebration, uh, when we're allowed to do so. And I feel very strongly about this. It was one of the reasons that I think you knew Matt, that we were planning to bring commencement back to campus anyway, because I feel very strongly that we should, we should, uh, graduate our students on their, their home campus. Uh, so I just don't, I just don't know when we're gonna be able to do it. And of course we'll be in touch with the seniors and their families well in advance of, uh, scheduling that day when we ultimately do, let me just say one other thing. If I may, Matt, some questions have come up about, well, if I need a degree in order to start a job or whatever, may I get my degree in advance? And the answer is yes. I mean, once you complete your, your coursework and we deem it, uh, satisfactory to your, towards your degree, then, um, we can either grant you your diploma or, or send a letter to an employer saying that this person has satisfied and is now a graduate, even if we haven't had this ceremony yet. So I know that's an important consideration for, um, for some people

Matt Harmon:
That's a great point to bring up, uh, let's finish with this one, president Lehe, if you are a member of the Monmouth student population right now, and you are having any kind of issues, whether it be class related, whether it be financial related, uh, whether it be home related, what is the best way for students to maybe I'll say troubleshoot for lack of a better term, any issues that they might be having in, in your opinion?

Patrick Leahy:
Well, two ways. So the first is monmouth.edu/relief, monmouth.edu/relief gets you access to a very short form. I mean, three questions. I don't wanna make this overly bureaucratic, but just a few questions that you can fill out and submit to the president's office and that gets you into the relief fund, uh, process. So that would be one way the other, if there's just additional questions of any kind about anything I have made it very clear, you just need to email president monmouth.edu. And I see all of those emails. Um, I have people that helped me respond to them. Of course, if, if I can't get to them all, but I'll be honest, Matt, I was up till one o'clock last night, responding to family emails that have come in and student emails that have come in based on my, um, message that went out yesterday. And I quite frankly consider that one of the delights of the job is again, if there's a problem and I know about it, I have a fighting chance to do something about it.

Patrick Leahy:
If I don't know about it and I can't do anything about it. Um, so one of those two mechanisms gives you, uh, direct access, uh, to me and to the office of the president. And of course, if you get to me, I can, uh, you know, farm those out to, uh, keep people around the campus to try to get your, your questions answered as quickly as possible. I have said two things. We will be rapidly responding to inquiries that come in and they will be as personalized, highly personalized as possible because I think the students deserve it.

Matt Harmon:
And I know from a student perspective and a faculty relationship perspective, I've heard from a ton of my students, whether they're those that are in any of the classes that I teach, whether those that are advisees. So the door is open and I'm sure you're encouraging students to do the same, uh, class related type stuff. Get in touch with faculty. That should be very accessible, able to answer emails, able to answer questions. Um, the communication that has really gone on and we can finish with this last point, the communication from a university community standpoint, I'm sure for you as the president in, in a really strange, almost dark time does bring a little bit of a smile to your face.

Patrick Leahy:
Oh, it does. I I'll repeat what I said last time. You know, we, we're gonna be physically separated and, and now we know we're gonna be physically separated for at least the next six weeks or so as we get through this spring semester, but we wanna try really hard to stay emotionally connected. And uh, I mean the faculty and the staff and the students and the, and the members of our board of trustees and anyone who cares about Mammouth, we wanna try hard to stay connected to the extent we can during this really challenging time so that we can support each other and get each other's back. Our, our provost, Dr. Daah had a nice, uh, comment the other day. She said, we want you to know students that we have have your back from six feet away. She said in order to comply with the social distancing, uh, guidelines. So, uh, that is the spirit of Monmouth university. And, uh, I wanna use this challenging time to, um, reinforce those values.

Matt Harmon:
President Lehe has always appreciate your time. Uh, look forward to doing this on a weekly basis more if needed, we will continue to update you, uh, through our little podcast series that we've got going on mammoth weekly. Uh, sir, enjoy the rest of your day today, leading into the weekend and look forward to talking to you real soon.

Patrick Leahy:
Yeah. Thanks again, Matt be well,

Matt Harmon:
President Patrick Lehe. I'm Matt Harmon. You've been listening to Monmouth weekly for more information, stay up to date on all things Monmouth related, go to monmouth.edu. Thanks so much for listening. Continue to be safe, continue to be well. We'll continue to get through this together and look forward to talking to you real soon.