Five weeks of radio silence during a pandemic is unacceptable
Reporting about the SGA, not a record of it: The Johns Hopkins News-Letter published this and the SGA did not write it, file it, or approve it. The archive holds it because the article itself uses the phrase “student government”.
Summary
- This News-Letter editorial covers Hopkins’ delayed announcement that fall classes would be online and the communication issues the article says surrounded it.
- The paper reported that President Ronald J. Daniels had urged administrators to explain decisions while making them, but that University leaders announced an online-only fall on Aug. 6 after more than a month of silence.
- According to the article, it did not oppose the online decision, citing rising Baltimore infection rates and the share of undergraduates from coronavirus hot spots; it says bringing students back would have been unsafe.
- The article says the plan included S/U grade opt-outs, a 10 percent tuition reduction, virtual student employment and hardship aid, with lease-related aid requests due by Aug. 12 at 9 a.m.
- The reporter writes that the University’s announcement did not directly provide these details and that students learned about the aid after the Student Government Association published them.