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Syracuse University will likely expect all students, faculty and staff who do not have religious or medical exemptions to receive the COVID-19 vaccine by fall 2021, Chancellor Kent Syverud said in a University Senate meeting Wednesday.

Syverud recently announced in a campus-wide email that the university is planning to have a fully in-person semester in the fall. Although it is difficult to predict the state of the pandemic in  the future, Syverud said he’s confident that, with widespread distribution of vaccines, SU can plan for “more normal” operations.

“My expectation is that, as with the flu, we will be certainly expecting our students to be vaccinated by the fall and it will be widely available, with religious and medical exemptions, of course,” Syverud said.

The university required all students to receive a flu shot this year and offered the vaccinations for free on campus. Students without exemptions who didn’t receive flu shots could have been referred to the Office of Student Rights and Responsibilities.

“It’s too soon to know exactly what COVID-19 will look like six months from now, but with the improving conditions and continued optimism on the part of elected officials we work with, I expect by August we will return to the full range of in-person classes and experiences,” Syverud said during the meeting.

Matthew Huber, an associate professor of geography and the environment and co-chair of the University Senate’s Academic Affairs Committee, also presented the faculty census for the 2020-21 academic year during the meeting.

According to the census, SU saw a 3.6% decline in total faculty since the last census and a nearly 10% decline overall in part-time faculty at the university in the past year. The number of white faculty also decreased by 0.7%, with a slight increase in the amount of Asian, Black and Hispanic or Latino faculty. About 70% of the faculty identifies as white, according to the census.

Members of the University Senate also continued discussing concerns about artifacts in SU’s Special Collections Research Center. 

Interim Vice Chancellor and Provost John Liu announced that the university plans to purchase an environment-controlled chamber to hold the most at-risk items in the collection. It is over 700 square feet and will provide the library with the space it needs for the time being, Liu said.

“I can assure you that we are going to continue this work until the problem is solved,” Liu said. “We have carefully considered all of the options and feel that the interim solution followed by active fundraising is the best solution available to us at this time.”

But some senators still expressed concerns about the university’s interim solution.

Petrina Jackson, the director of SU’s Special Collections Research Center, said that the chamber would only take care of 4% of the endangered materials. She also expressed concern over whether it would take up space in module one, another area that holds some of the center’s materials.

Jackson suggested the money for the chamber go toward module 2, a proposed climate-controlled addition to SU’s existing library storage building on Jamesville Avenue.

Mark Monmonier, a professor of geography and the environment and the chair of the University Senate Committee on the Libraries, also expressed frustration about transparency between the university and the committee. He asked for clarification about several technical aspects of the chamber, including a timeline of how it will be installed and its cost. 

“If I sound annoyed, it’s because I am,” Monmoneir said. 

David Seaman, the dean of SU Libraries, assured the senators that he will continue to work with Liu to solve issues in the library and address their concerns. 

“None of us are going to let the interim solution become, somehow, the solution,” Seaman said.

Published on March 24, 2021 at 9:01 pm

Contact Maggie: mehicks@syr.edu | @maggie_hickss