Message from Dean Ritter

Thu Jun 11 10:37:16 EDT 2020

   Dear all,

      I wish to share a message that Dean Ritter sent to all department chairs.

-Brian

Message from the Dean

Dear Colleagues,

The events of the last two weeks here in Columbus and around the world continue to impact all of us and provoke questions about the role our college should be playing in support of efforts to achieve justice and equity in our community. This is a large topic and one I would like to return to more substantially in the coming weeks. As we ponder these issues, we are also faced with planning for the resumption of classes and the reopening of campus, and it is on these topics that I want to offer a few initial thoughts and invite your feedback today. Already we are beginning to reopen our research facilities in a phased manner. Beginning in August, we will welcome students back to campus. The plan for the fall semester is to provide a mix of in person, hybrid, and online courses. With all classes of 90 students or more going online, we are relying on the smaller and medium size classes to provide students with the rich, immersive experiences you can get from a lab class, field class, small seminar, recitation section, or studio course. Adjustments and preparation will be happening over the summer so that this can be done in ways that avoid undue risks, through spacing, hygiene, directional signage, mechanisms for health monitoring, and so forth. David Horn is leading the Back to Teaching effort for the fall that will assist departments in making the adjustments needed to provide courses in this new mixed format. As things stand currently, we should expect that the same measures and approaches will be in place for the campus next spring.

Between the resumption of on campus research and the restart of teaching in the fall, we will conduct a phased reopening of our offices. Charles Emery and Sergio Soave are leading the Back to Campus committee, to help us plan for the physical reopening of our offices over the summer. In my conversation with Sergio and Charles yesterday, I offered some suggestions about how we should approach this, drawing from the Safe Campus and Scientific Advisory subgroup guidelines (a committee on which I serve) and other guidance that is coming forth from various parts of the Post-Pandemic planning efforts.  Among the things I suggested were as follows:

  *   Wherever possible, we will work to accommodate faculty or staff who request accommodations because they fall into one of the CDC’s high-risk health category’s for COVID-19<https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/osu.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=c812e18d654f1fe5373358d17&id=4ee4f79486&e=5782918521__;!!KGKeukY!iS76K07WrybMvdPnRKKla8s8BQr6oqlNMqewNW6QUKriXoNL7r8cZh5iFDL8-lW3$>, or because they live with someone who falls into a high-risk category for COVID-19. For staff, this could mean that we continue to provide them with options to work from home. For faculty, this could mean providing them with course assignments that do not require them to teach face to face.

  *   While we work to limit congestion on campus, we will also aim to provide sufficient staffing in all of our units and in all of our buildings to be present and responsive to the needs of faculty and students. This would mean a presence in all of our public facing or serving units – such as advising, the dean’s office, career services, department and school offices, etc. That said, I want to encourage all of you who are able as unit leaders to model an approach that mixes an on campus and off campus presence – to spend part of the week in your office and part of the week working from home. In the dean’s suite, we normally have 10-12 people working there on any given day. I expect that by the time we have fully resumed this fall, we will have one third to one half of the presence in my office that we normally have.

  *   There may be some areas and units that can continue to work entirely or almost entirely remotely this coming academic year. This might include our budget and finance folks, for instance.

  *   We should limit the size of meetings. If you are like me, you will be very happy to get away from Skype and Zoom for a while. As we reopen campus, it will be possible to have small in person meetings, provided we follow the safe campus guidelines about spacing, wearing a mask, etc. However, my advice is to avoid any regular in person meetings of ten or more. For all regular group meetings it is important to provide a virtual option for participation for folks who are not coming in to campus. Even for one on one meetings, please be sure that these occur at a safe social distance and it is recommended that you wear a mask. My own plan is to try to have some of my meetings outside, in which case it would be acceptable to not wear a mask if you are properly distanced.
Before any of this can happen, however, we will need to make plans – for the cleaning and reopening of buildings (buildings need to be certified as ready by FOD), for appropriate PPE and hygiene supplies, for ways to configure spaces to assure proper social distancing, as well as what our needs and expectations will be for our fall classes.  We also need to hear from faculty and staff who are requesting accommodations. Our HR team is getting ready to release a form that can be used for requesting accommodations for those who are or who live with someone in a high-risk health category. The Back to Campus committee is getting ready to ask for input for your space needs and staffing plans for the resumption of work on campus. The Back to Teaching committee will be offering guidance and working with departments to develop plans for classes in the fall. The central HR office, as well as other committees working on post-pandemic planning, will be issuing further guidance to help us with our planning.

It continues to be the case, in this extraordinary year, that much work remains to be done. At the same time, once we receive further input from the departments, we will begin to move forward with preliminary budget decisions. Unfortunately, it looks likely that we will need to manage a significant budget reduction this coming year. That will likely require several large changes in how we do things and what we fund over the next year or two. None of this will be easy, and all of the effort going into resuming life on campus under constrained circumstances is likely to be taxing and stressful. My first hope is that by working together on all of this, in the collaborative and committed fashion that all of you have demonstrated time and again, we will meet these challenging circumstances in a way that is mindful of our values and remains focused on our mission. My second hope is that by being smart, strategic and caring, we will emerge from these difficulties more quickly than we would otherwise and be well-positioned to advance research, creative and educational excellence.

I welcome your thoughts, suggestions and questions.

Take care,
Gretchen

Announcements

Next Arts and Sciences Town Hall to be held June 18
Please share with faculty and staff.
As an initial step to understanding the college's transition back to on-campus operations, we will host another faculty and staff town hall on Thursday, June 18, from 3:30-5 p.m.<https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/osu.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=c812e18d654f1fe5373358d17&id=2e94e0782c&e=5782918521__;!!KGKeukY!iS76K07WrybMvdPnRKKla8s8BQr6oqlNMqewNW6QUKriXoNL7r8cZh5iFFmWYmDu$> Executive Dean Gretchen Ritter will be joined by Dean Amy Fairchild and Senior Associate Dean Bill Miller of the College of Public Health to share updates and answer questions. Register for this town hall online.<https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/osu.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=c812e18d654f1fe5373358d17&id=e0ab6a4b7b&e=5782918521__;!!KGKeukY!iS76K07WrybMvdPnRKKla8s8BQr6oqlNMqewNW6QUKriXoNL7r8cZh5iFIbBU-Ad$>

Share your thoughts on culture in the College of Arts and Sciences at June focus groups
Please share with faculty and staff.
As part of an ongoing series aimed at illuminating the experience of working within the Arts and Sciences, the college is hosting three focus groups throughout June. These 45-minute Zoom sessions will invite faculty and staff throughout the college to share desired norms, values and aspects of the college culture.

Each session can hold 40 participants. Please review the upcoming session dates and register using the links below. More sessions will be scheduled every month through September.

Faculty (including associated faculty):<https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/osu.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=c812e18d654f1fe5373358d17&id=f40c2d67cf&e=5782918521__;!!KGKeukY!iS76K07WrybMvdPnRKKla8s8BQr6oqlNMqewNW6QUKriXoNL7r8cZh5iFJkxxiIs$> Tuesday, June 16, at 11 a.m.
Staff:<https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/osu.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=c812e18d654f1fe5373358d17&id=fbd51ab3d2&e=5782918521__;!!KGKeukY!iS76K07WrybMvdPnRKKla8s8BQr6oqlNMqewNW6QUKriXoNL7r8cZh5iFCA1r9i3$> Tuesday, June 23, at 11 a.m.
Open Call (Faculty and Staff):<https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/osu.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=c812e18d654f1fe5373358d17&id=9c04c1b5e2&e=5782918521__;!!KGKeukY!iS76K07WrybMvdPnRKKla8s8BQr6oqlNMqewNW6QUKriXoNL7r8cZh5iFCcA6N0q$> Tuesday, June 30, at 2 p.m.

Promotion and Tenure

ASC Dossier Prep Workshop June 24
Please share with appropriate faculty and staff.
The College of Arts and Sciences will hold a dossier preparation workshop for department administrative staff, P&T committee chairs and procedure oversight designees on Wednesday, June 24, from 1-3 p.m. via Zoom. This workshop will focus on dossier forms and assembly of the complete dossier for submission to the college. Please plan to have at least one representative from your department participate. Note that this is NOT appropriate for faculty candidates for promotion as it deals with steps that occur after the core dossier is submitted to the department. The Zoom link is: https://osu.zoom.us/j/92856585857<https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/osu.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=c812e18d654f1fe5373358d17&id=77fd48b550&e=5782918521__;!!KGKeukY!iS76K07WrybMvdPnRKKla8s8BQr6oqlNMqewNW6QUKriXoNL7r8cZh5iFO-uDd6r$>

2020 College and University Deadlines

July 2: Deadline for submission of annual review letters for tenure-track faculty to the college

[signature_1622624814]
Brian L. Winer
Professor and  Chair
Department of Physics
1040R Physics Research Building
614-292-2653 Office
winer.12 at osu.edu

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