University Challenged

[pancreas]

I absolutely cannot see the point in masks when the cunts will be cheek-by-jowl filling a 300 seat lecture hall to the brim and spitting down each other's fuckholes every goddamn night.

[Ferris]

...and that's just at pancreas' flat !!

[A Hat Like That]

Welcome Week at my university coming up next week.

Everybody ready?

LOL. Yeah. Sure.

[A Hat Like That]

all of the multi-layer security log-ins we now have

SNAP!

Except we're introducing those MIDWAY through term.

[Attila]

SNAP!

Except we're introducing those MIDWAY through term.

Yeah, that's usually a page out of my uni's playbook. Best one was completely and utterly revamping and changing our intranet midway through a semester -- no one amongst students or staff could find anything subsequently, just before finals.

As usual, mine has come up with about half a dozen new initiatives in the past two weeks with no formal announcements, no testing of systems, no consultation with staff. I still have zero idea how we're meant to implement the new attendance policy which involves having to generate security codes for the students each time we have a new class with them (so, for example, if I have a lecture at 12, and then the seminars in different rooms at different hours that day or later in the week, I have to generate all new codes for the students. Oh, and triage any problems they have despite learning that I have to do all of this...three days ago).

I absolutely cannot see the point in masks when the cunts will be cheek-by-jowl filling a 300 seat lecture hall to the brim and spitting down each other's fuckholes every goddamn night.

Same -- we are required to have one to one tutorials via Teams for the 'students protection and mental well being' yet they're being crammed back into lecture halls, not wearing masks, attending a billion social events the university is organising, and doing fuck knows what in halls and housing when they're not in class.

[A Hat Like That]

Last year, we made the assumption that they'd be up to all sorts off campus so all our on-campus stuff essentially assumed they were riddled. Only way to be sure.

[greencalx]

Here it's a legal requirement for students (though not staff) to wear masks while in the University, so we can at least deflect any criticism of whether this is pissing in the wind to the government. Nevertheless, I think we're in a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't situation.

I gather there are some departments which are doing little in the way of in-person teaching, for reasons that are unclear to me. I'm using a bit more real estate than in the pre-covid days, which might be reducing the space available for other classes but one feels this ought to be compensated by the fact that essentially all lectures are taking place online. Apparently there is some discontent among students who have turned up to discover a single fortnightly in-person class on their timetable. As I said before, I think my own department has struck a pragmatic balance between offering a decent amount of in-person teaching without having too many people in the same space at the same time. We'll see how it plays out. Despite the fact I hate online teaching with a passion, I am also glad I won't be walking into a theatre of 300 coughing students on Monday[nb]My predecessor on my course contracted measles a few years ago, I suspect as a result of the first of the Wakefield generation coming through. They were hospitalised with complications including meningitis. The first thing I did when I took over the course was to get the MMR jab - I'd lost my childhood vaccination record so although I'm fairly sure I'd have been jabbed, I didn't want to take any chances. If you're of a nervous disposition, I would not advise looking up R0 for measles.[/nb]. But I do plan to drop into the workshops to say Hello (and to show some solidarity with the TAs who'll be doing most of the in-person teaching).

I think whilst mask-wearing and distancing may be to some extent performative when the students can go out together in the evening and do whatever they like with each other, the University is probably insisting on it in the hope it can avoid the negative press of outbreaks on-campus. With cases starting to fall up here, it would be great if the start of term doesn't reverse that as otherwise universities are going to get blamed even though we're about the only place left where mask-wearing and distancing is still a thing! It's not clear there's a better alternative route. If we were able to return to business as usual, as is possible down south, that almost guarantees a spike. If we reverted to fully online, as some colleagues apparently seem to want, we'd be looking at the continued stress and workload implications of trying to do something that the level of tech we have right now isn't really capable of, further exacerbating student mental and physical health problems arising from isolation and being stuck on the other side of a screen all day[nb]I've seen at first hand the highly deleterious effects of this on students who were previously acing their courses[/nb], and, in the longer term, students will fuck off to places where in-person is the norm and we'll not have anyone left to teach with inevitable redundancies as a consequence.

It's a tricky situation with no right answer, although plenty of wrong ones (as demonstrated upthread).

[A Hat Like That]

My thoughts exactly.

We've planned all labs around reduced numbers and maintaining many of the rules from last year. Lectures etc are different but we've let staff continue teaching online if they so wished. Rooms have been underfilled i.e. 300 capacity for ca. 100.

My department's plan A is the University plan B*, and we have everything set up for moving sessions online. Review in Week 7 and at Christmas. Cross everything.

Not entirely sure anyone else has spotted that the Govt winter plan appears to be a vaccine mandate for Universities if they move up to their second tier of restrictions.

*actually got a minor bollocking for this. I stood my ground.

[greencalx]

We're now three weeks in (if you include welcome week) and a spike is yet to materialise. The case rate in the university is running at about 1/3rd that of the general population. Interestingly the screening programme seems to be running at a higher rate of positives, which suggests it's doing what it's supposed to be doing and catching asymptomatic cases. I also feel more reassured by twice weekly negative tests. Especially after having spent a day and a half circulating first year classes - not because anyone made me, but because I missed meeting students in the flesh last year. They all seemed happy enough, which is good. And all wearing their masks. I guess that's what they've been doing at school for the last year so it probably feels more natural for them than it does for us.

So you never know. We may just get away with this.

[Ferris]

We're in the same boat. After the mandate, I'm told by some admin bod that our university is ~98% fully vaccinated and the other 2% are mainly lads from China that have had a non-approved vaccine so they're a bit stuck in administrative limbo but essentially fully vaccinated.

Despite this stupid party of several thousand undergraduates in a random residential neighbourhood which made the local news, no explosion of cases so also getting away with it.

Wait and see time I suppose. We are retaining social distancing, capacity limits and mandatory indoor masking until the pandemic is declared over, the only jurisdiction in North America to do so which is nice fing to do innit Andy.

[Alberon]

I'm seeing a lot less mask wearing when students are piling in for a lecture, but not bad in general. We have no social distancing in classroom layouts, but we've been asked to put a plan in place if a return to 1m+ social distancing is required.

I'm still generally optimistic, though it is very weird to be walking through the university with all these people around. We've virtually had the place to ourselves the last year and a half.

[A Hat Like That]

I think we had at least ca. 50 % of our cohort catch it last year (as in, it was reported to uni systems), so that's likely to be an underestimate.

One, older, member of staff has now caught it, during Welcome Week, so not quite in the clear yet.

[A Hat Like That]

We are retaining social distancing, capacity limits and mandatory indoor masking

I'd be happier with this in place. We've got 1/3 in general university buildings and another 1/3 in the labs I'm responsible for (where we actually can't do masking but goggles, gloves etc are all in place).

[A Hat Like That]

do do do
let's all do the Covid
do do do
colleague went to an Away Day with symptoms
do do do
there was no to little ventilation
do do do
let's all do the Covid

Think only one confirmed follow-on infection but STILL mate

[greencalx]

That's reckless. Though the fact it doesn't seem to have caused an outbreak suggests that immunity amongst the student body is high. We're currently reporting one case per 10000 students each day, five times lower than the general population.

[A Hat Like That]

Away Day is staff only, so the one other infection was a fairly senior member of staff. Yes, older. Yes, likely other medical issues.

Reckless ain't the word.

[greencalx]

Ah right. Got you. Thought you meant a field trip or something. Interestingly online is still mostly the default for us, tutorials and small research / lab meetings being the exception. I think it makes sense to reserve in person for essential situations where online doesn't really work. I'm not sure staff meetings count.

[buttgammon]

Deleted an angry post because this would carry a risk of being doxxed etc but if anyone has recently seen a very misinformed article on a well-known website about lecturers at a certain university being lazy and online learning,  feel free to PM me.

[greencalx]

Anyone else out on the picket today?

[Alberon]

Been looking on the security cameras over the last few days. The strikers have been picketing a different entrance each day rather than trying to cover them all. There's only about five of them.

It's harder than ever to tell how many are taking part with so many working from home a lot of the time anyway.

[greencalx]

While on the one hand I am very pissed off at the proposed 25% reduction to my pension (and, probably, I guess, also yours), I also think that the Union has struggled to find an effective way to put pressure on university managers. Striking on the last three days of term? Who's going to notice that? During the exam boards next month, then we'd be talking...

[dr beat]

I possibly have similar thoughts.  While I voted in favour of the strike action it was with reservations. I worry about what the negotiation strategy is among UCU top brass.  While I agree fully in principle with the reasons for striking I wonder if the UCU is trying to fight too many battles all at once.  And that they are doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting different results each time.  There was a lot of energy, support and momentum in 2018, I don't sense this now.

[Milo]

Seems like a work to rule would have more broad support and effect, especially if being overworked is one of the issues.

[greencalx]

We are doing that too. I did mention to my boss that working to contract would involve taking the whole of December off as leave...

[Ferris]

[Milo]

They did update that headline later to something like, "I support the strikers but worry it'll disrupt my degree".

[Alberon]

My unis term ends tomorrow and those that can work from home will do so from Monday.

I'm in facilities management so I'll still be in and preparing the classrooms for the spring term.

At the moment we're assuming there will be no extra measures like a return to social distancing. Though my boss expects that the way things are going we will at least start the term without f2f teaching.

[poo]

last week of teaching is going online. Hopefully next back on campus in October. 

[Attila]

Big uni wide meeting this afternoon (via Teams) to repeatedly tell us that all teaching next week MUST be face-to-face because it's what the students want.

I guess they haven't asked my students, because my afternoon cohort, at least, was asking why we're not going online next week, considering it's the last week of the term, and it's all review sessions, tutorials, and assignment submissions anyway.

But I expect to go in all five days, as usual (I have a timetable from hell this semester -- 16 contact hours per week, up from 9 when I first started there 10 years ago).

Today *should* have been the last day of the term, but management decided in August to extend the semester by a week so that the students would get more value for money. My whole being wants to slump into the post-semester sigh of relief, but can't, because I still have that extra week to go. So instead of a buffer week ahead of xmas to mark the four assignments coming in, I'll be working like a mofo to get them done and dusted in a weekend to be shut of the damned things.

As we speak, my dept's Christmas party is underway, about 25 people crammed into a small room of the dept's fave pub. That's a 'nope' from me.

[buttgammon]

Even the bananas student group that criticised us for not working hard enough or giving them 'value for money' with online learning (a complaint made at a time when all small-group teaching was being held face-to-face) has started to acknowledge the existence of the pandemic and they're rightly concerned about in-person exams being held. Bet they'll be slagging off teaching staff in a heartbeat if we go back online in the new year.

For what it's worth, my experience is that the majority of students are very concerned about the safety of the teaching environment and are very supportive of the measures we've had to take, even when all teaching was online. The moaners are a small and evidently very unpopular minority.