The four individuals elected to the Board of Regents earlier this month are now in the process of preparing for their new roles at the University of Minnesota.

While serving on the governing body that oversees the entire University, these regents will make decisions on tuition and the budget, and oversee other large initiatives. The new regents, Ruth Johnson, Doug Huebsch, James Farnsworth and Kodi Verhalen spoke with the Minnesota Daily to discuss their backgrounds and priorities for the University.

Ruth Johnson

Hailing from Rochester, Minnesota, Johnson occupies the 1st Congressional District seat on the board.

In addition to working as a physician at the Mayo Clinic, Johnson also has experience in administrative roles at universities. She served on the board of trustees at Augsburg University for 17 years.

The experience of being an administrator and serving on a variety of committees has prepared her for this role, she said.

“I understand what it means to do governance, which is the role of the board — not to manage or micromanage, it’s to have the big picture government,” Johnson said.

Johnson’s identity as a woman and as a “women’s health advocate” will be an important part of her position on the board, she said.

“It’s very important to have different perspectives and that women’s experience. We have certain kinds of experiences that bring that richness and a depth and an understanding to our work in anything, including education on a governance board,” Johnson said. “Our life experiences balance against some of the life experiences of men that can be somewhat different.”

At the Mayo Clinic, Johnson became the first woman to serve as the associate director of the Internal Medicine Residency program, the largest program of its kind in the nation. She also founded and directed the Mayo Diagnostic Breast Clinic, which serves more than 10,000 women a year.

Johnson said that using her knowledge and experience as a physician to navigate the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic will be a priority as a regent. In addition, Johnson said improving the standing of the University’s Medical School is another goal she has for her time on the board.

Doug Huebsch

Occupying the 7th District seat, Huebsch comes to the University from northwestern Minnesota, where he works as a farmer and small business owner.

Huebsch is closely associated with the University, where all three of his children attended. He also previously served as the chair of the Alumni Association. Huebsch said he decided to run for a position on the board to keep advancing the University’s mission.

“If something is stagnant, you’re not moving the institution forward and we know we have a lot of work to do. There’s a lot of things that are going great, and we have a lot of great leaders but we have to continue marching forward,” he said.

For Huebsch, keeping students at the center of decision making and addressing increasing student debt and tuition rates will be a priority.

“I’m not going to tell you that I’m never going to raise tuition, because that’s an impossible thing to tell you. But we do need to make sure that as we increase tuition that the students are going to be successful,” he said. “We just have to look at all these other avenues of revenue, like our intellectual property or our alumni.”

James Farnsworth

Farnsworth, a fourth-year University student, was elected to the 4th District seat on the board.

Farnsworth, who also ran for a regent position in the 2019 election, has served in the Minnesota Student Association and on University Senate committees during his time as a student. Although Farnsworth took the semester off from classes to focus on his new role as a regent, he said he plans to complete his Human Resource Development degree in the near future.

Engaging with and offering the perspectives of students to the board will be a main focus for him as a regent, Farnsworth said.

“I would like to do some proactive outreach as well, so it’s not folks just feeling like they have to come to me,” he said. “I just want to pride myself in being as accessible as possible, especially to students, because I know what it’s like being in the shoes of a student and doing that student advocacy and outreach.”

Farnsworth also said he wants to push for increased accountability from the University.

“For me, accountability looks like asking tough questions, challenging administration about what the perception of something looks like, or making sure that if folks are displeased with a decision that the board has made or something that’s going on in administration, making sure to bring that up.”

Students have been advocating for the renaming of several campus buildings due to their namesakes’ racist history, two years after the board voted against renaming buildings in 2019. Farnsworth suggested creating a renaming policy before voting on renaming actual buildings, should the board discuss it in the future.

“That was what went wrong last time is that they [the board] weren’t having the policy discussion,” Farnsworth said. “First, it just went to the motion of renaming individual buildings. My position on that is that we need to do the policy work first before we talk about renaming any particular buildings.”

Kodi Verhalen

A University of Minnesota Duluth alum, engineer and lawyer, Kodi Verhalen was also elected to the board earlier this month. Verhalen replaced former regent Michael Hsu in the 6th District seat.

Verhalen said the events of the past year, such as the pandemic and the police killing of George Floyd, encouraged her to run for a regent position at the University.

“What I recognized was [that] we as a society, in general, have not had a great opportunity to just totally reinvent what life, work, education, society looks like,” she said. “I think the last 12 months have given us an opportunity not only to identify where our weaknesses are, but where our strengths are, and how we want to come out of this.”

Verhalen also said she was excited to see the growth of people who identify as women on the board. A mother of one, Verhalen became president of the National Society of Professional Engineers when her daughter was 9 months old.

“I will say, [the] five women [on the Board of Regents] — we’re not all the same, we’re all coming at it from different perspectives. I have a young daughter and so I’m approaching it differently than someone who may have grown children or no children,” Verhalen said. “I think the commonality is, we’re all interested in supporting the University of Minnesota in the state of Minnesota in different ways. “

Before voting or discussing important topics, like tuition costs or the renaming of campus buildings, Verhalen said discussing with different stakeholder groups will be important for her.

“I like to … let [stakeholders] process through their conversation and where they’re coming from and how they are approaching the issue as well, without me inserting myself,” Verhalen said. “And then [I] have that conversation with the decision-makers about the things I’m hearing and the things that I feel like we’re still missing before we can make a decision.”

After nearly 30 years with the University of Minnesota, senior administrator Chris Cramer announced he will leave his position in June.

Cramer, who has served as the vice president for research since 2018, will be joining the Chicago-based research organization Underwriters Laboratories (UL). During his time at the University, Cramer has established several specialized research offices and helped the University exceed $1 billion in research expenditures.

“I’ve never loved the job more in my life than I love vice president for research, and that’s because you get the opportunity to bring people together who might not otherwise have known to join one another,” Cramer said. “There’s always something new you can be working on; you have a real opportunity to see the future.”

Before taking on the vice president for research position, Cramer held a faculty position in the chemistry department and served as the director of undergraduate studies for chemistry at the University.

Cramer’s decision to step away was motivated by the recent relocation of his wife, Laura Gagliardi, to the Chicago area. Gagliardi was a chemistry professor at the University before moving to the University of Chicago last year.

“We were prepared to commute [from] Minneapolis to Chicago; it’s not that bad. We see each other with some frequency, but it did cause me to begin paying attention to potential opportunities in Chicago,” Cramer said.

After leaving his duties at the University in June, Cramer will take on the senior vice president and chief research officer position at UL, where his main responsibility will be advancing science and safety-related research.

“Chris will help us ask the right questions, engage with the scientific community, and facilitate collaborations on a growing range of issues,” said UL President and CEO Terrence Brady in a statement emailed to the Minnesota Daily.

Although the University is an educational institution and UL is a nonprofit organization, the roles have some similarities, Cramer said, such as the opportunity to engage with students through research internships.

Late last year, Cramer worked to launch a collaboration with the organization BioMADE and the U.S. Department of Defense aimed at improving the national bioindustrial manufacturing industry by connecting researchers across the country with resources.

While Cramer is leaving the University and his position on BioMADE’s board of directors, work on the project will continue amid the transition in leadership, he said.

“I think there’s tremendous excitement in the local community, not just the University, but all the people working in the biomanufacturing space to develop relationships with and have an opportunity to look at startups that may come,” Cramer said.

When reflecting on his time as the vice president for research, Cramer also pointed to the creation and management of the University’s Strategic Partnerships and Research Collaborative (SPARC) as a personal success.

SPARC is a research hub designed to connect faculty and students to research projects that may be relatively unknown or large and complex, said Amy Kircher, co-director of the SPARC office.

“Chris has been a real champion and a leader for thinking differently, for setting a tone to try new ways to be innovative and pull research together and build partnerships. I don’t know that that’s always a university’s culture,” Kircher said. “The fact that he was willing to take a chance on SPARC … it’s been a real asset at the University.”

The University will eventually launch a national search for candidates to fill the position. In the meantime, Michael Oakes will serve in the interim position for two years. Oakes, the associate vice president for research, currently reports to Cramer.

Filling the position will be a large responsibility, Oakes said.

“I’m excited and a little bit scared. I hope to rise to the occasion,” Oakes said. “I’m a very tall person — I’ve got size 15 shoes — but I’ve told Chris, ‘I’ve got big feet, but I’m not sure I can fill your shoes.’”

The Minnesota State Legislature voted to elect four new regents to the University of Minnesota Board of Regents Monday evening.

Michael Hsu, who served on the board since 2015, was replaced by Elk River attorney and engineer Kodi Verhalen for the Sixth District seat. Other new board members include doctor Ruth Johnson, University student James Farnsworth and Minnesota farmer Doug Huebsch.

These new board members will replace current regents Tom Anderson and Richard Beeson, who did not run for reelection, and Randy Simonson, who withdrew from the race in January.

Each regent will serve a six-year term on the board where they vote on major decisions impacting the University like budget changes and tuition increases, and drive long-term initiatives like the University’s recently-announced collaboration with Google.

The unpaid board is made up of one member from each of the state’s eight congressional districts and four from the state at-large. Four spots on the board were up for reelection this year.

Johnson, a doctor at the Mayo Clinic, was elected to the First Congressional district seat. Johnson will take the place of Simonson.

Farnsworth, a fourth-year student at the University, will occupy the Fourth District seat. Board policy requires that one board member be a student at the time of election. Though Farnsworth is a current University student, he was not elected to the student seat on the board. Regent Mike Kenyanya, a University of Minnesota Duluth alum elected to the board in 2019, will occupy the student seat until 2025.

Huebsch will take the place of Anderson and occupy the Seventh District seat.

This is a breaking news report. More information may be added as it becomes available.

Editor’s note: A previous version of this story contained several errors and misrepresented the process of urgent authority approval. The story has since been taken down, updated and corrected. 

As the University of Minnesota prepared in August to reopen campuses to students for the first time since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, President Joan Gabel needed to take quick action. She advised the Board of Regents to purchase a large quantity of testing kits for an estimated more than $10 million using University funds. 

Now, the regents have unanimously voted to revise the policy that helped them respond quickly to the health crisis. This policy lets the board make decisions on situations that may immediately impact the University’s public health, safety or finances. The new process asks that the board chair make an effort, when possible, to gather the full board before approving a president’s request for urgent action. 

Gabel bought these testing kits for the University after the board approved her request for urgent approval. The board is the governing body that oversees the University and that Gabel reports to. 

In scenarios where public health and safety or the University’s finances may be immediately impacted, the president must request urgent approval authority from the board before taking quick action. 

According to Regent Darrin Rosha, who introduced the revision in October 2020, the board did not change the process as a result of presidents misusing the power in the past. Instead, this policy change acknowledges that regents can use technology to meet relatively quickly in virtual meetings, giving them a greater ability to approve decisions as a full board. 

“The COVID-19 environment has changed a lot,” Rosha said. “We’re able to conduct board meetings and board business in a much shorter time frame than before. Recognizing that we now can convene a board meeting within matters of minutes, it is consistent with the state constitution and our own rules that the full board would participate in decision making.”

The amendment to the policy dictates that the board chair should attempt to gather the full board in an emergency or special meeting to discuss the subject before approving urgent action by the president. 

If calling a special or emergency meeting is impossible, the board chair can approve the request on behalf of other board members.

“We will make every effort to try and constitute the board because we think that’s the best way to proceed, to get all 12 individuals’ input,” Regent Janie Mayeron said. “But nonetheless, there still may be a situation that arises that there just isn’t enough time.”

At board meetings, Mayeron and Rosha both cited hypothetical situations, like having an active shooter on campus or a fire in a University library, as scenarios when the board might use the urgent approval authority. 

In addition to the purchase of COVID-19 testing kits in August, Gabel has only requested that the board use urgent approval authority one other time  — to declare a public health emergency at the beginning of the pandemic. 

Former University president Eric Kaler requested that the board use urgent approval authority several times since 2015. Some of these past uses were related to a sexual harassment investigation into former Gopher athletics director Norwood Teague; the board used the urgent approval authority to hire outside lawyers to investigate the case and establish an oversight committee.

The board altered the specific language within the policy revision several times when it was discussed at the December and February meetings, Mayeron said.

“The policy, to me, does the same thing the previous policy does, but it’s a better model of the same thing,” Mayeron said. “So I think this is a perfect example of people with differing opinions coming together, collaborating, trying to address the varying interests and coming up with a better result.”

Correction: Contrary to what was reported in the initial article, the Board of Regents requires the University of Minnesota president receive board approval before an urgent decision can be implemented. The regents amended the policy to encourage that the full Board of Regents be present before deciding whether to approve the president’s request. 

The University of Minnesota recently entered a partnership designed to further advance health sciences higher education and strengthen the healthcare workforce in Afghanistan over a five-year period.

The program, Advancing Higher Education for Afghanistan’s Development (AHEAD), will work to combat the limited access to higher education caused by ongoing conflict in Afghanistan. Supported by a $4 million contract from the United States Agency for International Development, the University will work to develop curricula, improve research capacities and train faculty and students in the health sciences at seven colleges in the country.

This new contract builds on past collaborations between the University and colleges in Afghanistan. The work on this project is ongoing and will likely extend beyond the five year period outlined in the partnership, said Dr. Carolyn Porta, a University professor of nursing and principal investigator on AHEAD.

“Money and human resources have been invested for many years in Afghanistan [since the Taliban fell in 2001.] Despite ongoing violence and insecurity, there is global commitment to supporting economic development and the higher education system because it is the higher education system in Afghanistan that is contributing to future generations of the Afghan workforce,” Porta said.

The University, selected by the Afghanistan government for its experience and success in the health sciences field, will specifically work to further higher education in disciplines like nursing, pharmacology and medicine.

Due to ongoing conflict in the country, access to higher education in these areas has decreased, especially for women and populations that have historically not had access, said Dr. Stephen Wiesner, a University professor of medical laboratory sciences and collaborator on the project.

This limited access to higher education then decreases the number of workers in healthcare industries, Wiesner said.

“During some periods of time, the government was openly hostile to education. That has really had a tremendous impact on the ability for them to provide qualified, educated people that will contribute to the health of the nation’s population,” Wiesner said.

The collaboration will help to enhance skills and techniques needed for hospital-based medical education, said Dr. Karimullah Shahpar, dean of Allied Health Sciences Faculty at the Kabul University of Medical Sciences in an email to the Minnesota Daily.

Currently, some individuals living in Afghanistan with complicated medical cases travel to neighboring countries like Iran, Pakistan and India to receive treatment. This costs millions of dollars and negatively impacts Afghanistan’s medical industry, Shahpar said.

“Through this partnership, if doctors, laboratory technicians, anesthetists, nurses and midwives are able to apply new and modern procedures, the number of patients who have to go to nearby countries for curative purposes would be decreased and their income would not be spent in medical tourism,” he said in the email.

Faculty like Porta and Wiesner will collaborate with the universities in Afghanistan to develop curricula and create research opportunities through specialized training sessions and meetings.

“We dig into the content of each of the courses to make sure what is being taught is relevant, and that there are no gaps or missing subjects,” Wiesner said. “It’s really a challenge in health sciences because new things are happening every day and new things are happening far more rapidly than current practice is evolving.”

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and ongoing violence in Afghanistan, faculty from the University are not planning on traveling to Afghanistan in the near future, Wiesner said. In the past, project leaders have met in India to work on the project in real-time.

The partnership will also work to address the barriers some students face in entering into higher education through looking at institutional policies and how access can be improved, Porta said.

“I don’t pretend to think that we are coming in to help solve a barrier problem that’s been around for maybe 20, 30, 50 or 1,000 years,” Porta said. “As a partner, I’m super interested in asking the question of, ‘What are you trying to accomplish and how can we come alongside to help you in that journey?’”

The University of Minnesota Board of Regents discussed findings from the recently concluded campus safety review and confirmed several systemwide strategic plan measures, among them a tuition-free program for low-income families, in a virtual meeting Friday.

The board also approved a policy that will allow the University to enter licensing and sponsorship agreements with alcoholic beverage companies.

The next board meeting will be Mar. 10-12.

Systemwide strategic plan measures

The board approved a set of new measures as part of the University’s systemwide strategic plan, which outlines the University’s major goals and priorities for the next five years.

The measures approved Friday include benchmarks that will assess the strategic plan’s effectiveness, such as improving graduation and retention rates for students of color and improving the ranking of the Medical School.

Some of these measures will be put on an online dashboard that will allow individuals to view the goals and the University’s progress in implementing them, President Joan Gabel said at the meeting.

One of the approved measures states that the University will create a tuition-free program for students whose families earn less than $50,000 a year.

This program will apply to students from low-income families across all five system campuses, many of whom are also supported by need-based scholarships and grants. The program will fund the portion of a student’s tuition not covered by other scholarships or financial aid, Gabel said.

Although this measure was not discussed at the meeting, all of the goals were approved unanimously by the board.

It is likely the approved measures will be revised or added to in the future, Gabel said at the meeting.

“It would not only be normal, but a positive, if we end up editing, on occasion, what we have here in order to dive deeper and clarify as data becomes available or as circumstances and times suggest,” Gabel said.

Many regents said they were pleased that progress on the President’s Impact 2025 Systemwide Strategic Plan has continued amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I think we’re doing something new. I think this will make us into something that we’ve not been and create a lot of new things,” regent Ilean Her said at the meeting.

Alcohol sales policy

In a 7-5 vote, the board approved a new policy that will allow University logos and trademarks, excluding mascots, to appear on alcoholic beverages. The policy change has the potential to earn the Athletics Department up to $300,000 a year.

Some regents, and student representative to the board Rodrigo Tojo Garcia, expressed concern that the policy would promote drinking among students, as many undergraduates are under the legal drinking age.

“This policy could open the door to allowing alcohol advertising directly in University buildings meant for academic research or housing,” Tojo Garcia said at the meeting.

Regents Michael Hsu, Darrin Rosha and Mike Kenyanya expressed similar concerns.

The Minnesota Student Association (MSA) Sexual Assault Task Force also expressed concerns about the potential for an increase in sexual violence on campus and health consequences as a result of alcohol consumption. MSA urged the board to vote against the policy change in a statement submitted to the board last Tuesday.

“This work could undermine a lot of the important work being done to combat sexual violence on campus,” Lucie Allen, chairperson of the Sexual Assult Task Force, said at the forum meeting. “There’s a really strong correlation between hazardous drinking and perpetrating sexual assault.”

The approved policy indicates that a specific amount of the revenue from the alcohol sales will be allocated to the University’s education and counseling programs.

Campus safety review
Board members discussed the results of the recently concluded safety review of the University of Minnesota Police Department (UMPD) with Gabel and Dr. Cedric Alexander, the leader of the review.

Throughout the presentation, Alexander maintained that UMPD operates successfully as a police force. He also said the “undeniable tension” between those calling for less police presence and those calling for additional police presence on campus is occurring across the country.

Alexander stated that the Minneapolis Police Department killing of George Floyd last summer had a clear effect on student, faculty and staff feelings of safety on campus.

“George Floyd was the tipping point in this country that pushed us all back on our heels and made us recognize and see what it is that we can do differently around police reform,” he said at the meeting.

The report also identified that a greater level of transparency on UMPD’s operations and actions may be necessary. Some may have trouble differentiating UMPD from MPD, leading to greater mistrust of campus police, Alexander said.

“Nothing builds relationships greater and faster between police and the community than transparency,” he said at the meeting. “When people understand what their police department is doing, why they’re doing it, how they’re doing it, it creates an openness where people feel their public safety isn’t being provided by some clandestine operation.”

Sonja Kleven contributed to this report.

New research published last month by a University of Minnesota professor shows that discrimination can lead to the development of anxiety and and other mental health disorders.

The new research was published in a paper coauthored by University professor of psychology Dr. Robert Krueger and researchers from other universities, and builds on previous research into anxiety and discrimination. The findings show that anxiety can occur as a result of discrimination, regardless of an individual’s genetic predisposition to anxiety.

In the study, researchers controlled the genetic factors known to contribute to anxiety as they studied the effects of discrimination.

Discrimination refers to unfair treatment in everyday social contexts, Krueger said. This can be related to an individual’s race, gender or sexual orientation among other personal traits.

“Taking into account what we know at this point about genetic risk factors for anxiety, and controlling that or holding that constant, we found that discrimination still has an impact on anxiety,” Krueger said.

Though this area has been studied for more than two decades, researchers had not yet explored the direct links between discrimination and anxiety, while accounting for genetic predispositions.

“This is actually real and it really affects people’s mental health,” said Dr. Adolfo Cuevas, an assistant professor at Tufts University in Massachusetts and co-author on the paper.

Anxiety, which includes generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder and phobias, is the most common mental illness in the United States, affecting over 40 million adults every year.

“Over time, unresolved anxiety can lead to other negative effects, emotions, in which the whole system just gives up and becomes highly defensive, frustrated and angry,” said Dr. Matt Kushner, a professor of psychiatry at the University in an email to the Minnesota Daily.

In addition to these new developments, the paper also reflects the importance of understanding social context when studying mental health, Krueger said.

“As we try to pursue the underlying neuroscience and genetics, we can’t forget that human beings are embedded in a society and the changes in that society can have a big impact on mental health,” he said.

Although data for this study was collected several years ago, factoring in racial and other injustices in recent months and years, as well as current societal changes, will be an important facet of future research, Krueger said.

“As these kinds of studies go forward, things that happened in 2020, including the pandemic and all of these experiences, are definitely things we’re going to want to get a handle on,” he said.

Researchers also said they hope studies like these can eventually translate into changing larger policies and frameworks, such as mental health treatments by clinicians, around anxiety and discrimination.

“We’re hoping this paper helps us have a dialogue, a much more public dialogue, not just based on race, but also about other forms of stigma, like gender oppression, gender discrimination, wage discrimination,” Cuevas said. “This has real public health relevance and if we cannot heal as a group, we’re going to continue seeing disparities for the rest of our lives.”

In a virtual interview with the Minnesota Daily, University of Minnesota President Joan Gabel discussed the recently concluded safety review of the University Police Department and changes to higher education policies from President Joe Biden’s administration.

Gabel also weighed in on the Board of Regents election and the University’s relationship with Minnesota’s tribal nations.

She said the Board of Regents will discuss these topics further at meetings on Feb. 11 and 12.

This year, the Regent Candidate Advisory Council recommended four women and eight men as candidates for the Board of Regents. Four of the men are people of color, including Brandon Alkire, who could become the first Native American regent in the University’s history. What conversations have you had with the Minnesota Indian Affairs Council and the tribal nations about representation on the Board of Regents and the list of resolutions sent to the University over the summer?

The council sent over a resolution a few months ago, a lengthy resolution, really where they looked at a very holistic set of hopes and expectations for the relationship with the University. Some of those expectations were simply to be more structured and organized about our work with them so that we would commit to meeting at least three times a year, which we have been maintaining since then, in addition to one-on-one meetings with some of the chairs and other tribal council leaders. Then, some work and commitment around our complicated history, which, as we know, has been a journey and something that we would really like to see improve. They have hopes for where we would partner looking ahead and into things that we would do down the road.

Since Jan. 20, Biden has both signed into action and recommended various policy updates and changes that will affect higher education and the University of Minnesota. Some of these changes include extending the freeze on federal student loan payments and interest, an increase in guidance on COVID-19 plans for higher education and strengthening Title IX laws. How will the University respond and begin to implement these changes in the future?

So obviously we’re delighted with the attention that the new administration is paying both to student finances, to research support, to campus climate and Title IX and otherwise, and a few other related areas. We’re eager to work with the Biden administration. We’re grateful to see that doors are being reopened to our international students, and we’re very optimistic about how complying with these policies will be of benefit to the University of Minnesota.

We’ve been tracking the news and the executive orders that the president has been signing. I’ve personally been on some briefing calls that indicate where policy is likely to change. There hasn’t been anything yet that required a fundamental, you know, stop in your tracks and pivot to something else. We’re watching closely so that I don’t expect to be caught by surprise. The administration has been communicating a lot, and we’re watching really closely.

The results from Dr. Cedric Alexander’s safety review were published last week and will be discussed in depth at the February Board of Regents meeting. What was the most shocking result included in the review to you?

I wouldn’t say I was shocked, but I think the extent of the recommendations was probably more than we expected. I would consider that a good thing because it really feels like if we work our way through this, that we will have done everything we know how to do to improve this attribute of inclusion while also addressing the fact that crime is up. … I think that if I were to describe anything along the lines of surprise, it’s this recognition that there’s still a lot to do — that even at a place that’s deeply committed, that really wants to be better, where there is a very clear voice and not a lot of confusion, it’s still a lot of work, and that’s okay. We’re ready to do that work. I’m glad that we have now some structure to do that work. But now we need to do it, and that’s a chapter in and of itself.

How will you balance the potential added cost of these implementations, for equipment or other things, with the need to be financially responsible?

Every penny we spend is tough right now. Some of the things that UMPD needs, we would have to wait until the next budget, and it would have to come as part of the overall budget plan for the University. Some things that we would want to start now, we would use one-time money to bootstrap until we got to the next fiscal year and could go through the budget cycle. Everything we’re doing right now is in extreme recognition of our constrained financial resources.

A second round of CARES funds has been designated for higher education, an approximate $21.2 billion. According to experts, these funds will be more accessible to students. How will the distribution process to students differ from last year?

We’re expecting whatever distribution we receive to be similarly divided [between the] institution and students. But last time, there were a lot of restrictions on which students could receive funds. Many of those restrictions we expect will be lifted, which would allow us to distribute to more of our students. We’re waiting to get the final details, and then we would set up a distribution either through financial aid or emergency funds, much like we did last time. We would just be able to let more students know that money was available than we were able to with the first distribution of CARES funds.

The University’s budget request to the state is the lowest amount in approximately 20 years, at $46.5 million. What is the strategy behind requesting this amount, especially when the University is experiencing a large budget deficit?

The strategy here is that we are in a tough financial situation, but we have made reasonable plans to address our own shortfall. We have not had to do that on the backs of students. This was in a frozen tuition and frozen fee environment. We have made a set of collective community sacrifices in order to get through what we’re getting through. And now what we’re asking the state to do is to invest in the future and the strategic plan that we’ve recently passed. It’s a low amount relative to what we’ve asked for before, but it is the amount we received at the last biennial budget distribution. Our hope is that they will give us all of it, which would keep us on par with what the state has given us in the recent past. Were they to give us more, we could obviously use it, but this is what we need in order to get through this time. Then as things loosen up and revenues go back up again, you can be quite sure we will ask for more.

Has the University or will the University see an increase in academic programs that are canceled or paused as a result of low enrollment throughout the pandemic? What is the University doing to maintain programs and courses that may be more impacted by the pandemic than others?

There’s a regular cycle of programs that sunset and new programs that start. We do have some doctoral programs that have paused — it’s not enrollment issues; it’s job prospect issues on the other end that have encouraged those programs to pause for admission. A lot of universities are in hiring freezes, and doctoral students generally would be on the University market. If we bring a student in, we want them to have an open, active market when they finish. Those are pauses, not permanent cancellations or discontinuations. We have a lot of optimism that sooner rather than later, because of the vaccine, we’ll restart those programs.

This interview has been slightly edited for length, grammar and clarity.

In an interview with the Minnesota Daily, University of Minnesota President Joan Gabel weighed in on the budget deficit, body cameras for campus police and the distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine on campus.

Gabel also commented on a proposed tuition reimbursement bill and reflected on the lessons learned over the semester.

In the past several days, COVID-19 vaccinations have begun to be administered to people in populations at the highest risk. How is the University preparing for the eventual distribution of the vaccine to members of the University community? How will the University support this process?

The same team that handles the H1N1 and handles the flu vaccine every year is doing the planning now for the COVID vaccine. There’s some guidance on the tiering of who gets [the vaccine] first and we know it’s for the highest risk people now. As we get into the more general population, which most of us are fortunate to be in, we’ll get more and more guidance on the tiering, but in the meantime they’re already working on the distribution, the staffing, the extent to which we need refrigeration or deep freeze, how we’ll do the communication. All of that is being handled by the same team and they’ve done it before — not to this scale — but they’ve done it before.

The Minnesota Student Association recently passed a bill asking for a 3.3% tuition reimbursement for students as a result of one-third of the semester being completely online, though the University stated there are no plans to issue a reimbursement. Why is this proposal not being considered at the moment?

We knew that the semester would not be typical, and we froze tuition to reflect that. That was the compensation for the atypical semester, and the [Board of Regents] can make their own decision, but that was the meeting students in the middle that the administration did. It costs just as much to teach online, and there’s no history of our campus charging less for online classes. In fact, most of our online classes from before the pandemic cost more. So the course being online does not change the cost of the course, and the fact that the overall campus experience was altered is reflected in the tuition freeze.

As part of measures recently introduced at the Board of Regents meeting as part of the Systemwide Strategic Plan, one specific goal included creating a tuition free program for students’ families making less than $50,000 a year. What should students and parents know about this proposal? What steps need to be taken to make this a reality?

Students and parents should know that this is part of an overall process intended to make college more affordable for all of our students. We are starting with those with the highest need. That’s not the end of the story, and it’s not like a student whose family makes $50,001 gets no help at all. This is just the beginning of what is a sliding scale of support, much of which already exists. We started $50,000, because it’s a launching off point.

It’s not like one student is paying for another student’s opportunity, which I think was part of the misunderstanding. Once we get [families making $50,000 or less a year] supported, our intention is to keep going. So, it’s not like we go there, check a box and stop; this is a measure of a broader strategy that college should be affordable and debt should come down.

Administration recently proposed taking on an $80 million dollar loan to help cover the $166 million budget shortfall. What are your thoughts on this approach to managing the budget shortfall?

I actually think it’s a very reasonable part of the overall portfolio of steps that we’re taking. So, we’re not borrowing the entire amount, we are tightening our belts to get at most of the problem. But a lot of the budget shortfall comes from what we would call internally auxiliary units [Gopher Athletics, housing and dining], and auxiliary units are units that generate revenue to cover their own budget. The one everyone is talking about is athletics. … They generate revenue and then cover their own budget. Because of the cancellation of March Madness and of course everything that’s happened with fall sports, their revenue was very abruptly and deeply affected, but it should return. For them to take a loan on their own that they pay back from their revenue, this is not money coming out of the University to pay for athletics. This is the university helping athletics borrow their own money to cover their shortfall.

At the Board of Regents meeting held last week, UMPD Police Chief Matt Clark discussed the need and desire for body cameras for UMPD officers. What are your thoughts on this request? Will we see these implemented anytime in the near future?

I support the request, we have to work through the budget on it. It’s not a huge amount of money, but it’s money that we did not have budgeted. In these times, we’re very conscientious about every penny, but I don’t see why we wouldn’t be able to do it. If not in this semester, then as we go through the budget cycle over the summer.

It’s important to note [Clark has] been asking for [body cameras] since before I was president. The urgency didn’t have it percolate up through the budget the way it is now.

Reflecting on the past semester, is there anything you feel you’ve “gotten wrong” and what have you learned from it?

I don’t want to call this a mistake, because I do think it was the right thing to do, but I know that the delays at the very beginning of the semester and the suddenness of that were very disruptive. What I wish is that we could have seen that coming sooner, so that it wouldn’t have been so sudden. I know, having moved a child in and having had the date changed, how disruptive and just upsetting that was. I would call it a point of sadness, more than a mistake. But it’s still something that we’re thinking about a lot as we plan for the spring semester.

Based on what you’ve learned throughout fall semester, is there anything the University or administration plans to do or approach differently in the spring?

One of the biggest areas of discussion during the fall was the testing and a lot of difference of opinion and even amongst the deepest scientists about what is the best way to have a testing program on a campus. There were many people that disagreed with our approach, but it was one of the approaches that was scientifically recommended, and we followed it and we stayed consistent with it. We think it went well under the circumstances, but part of the reason that was the approach at the time was because the availability of tests was very low. … Tests are much more widely available now. By the time we restart for spring, we would expect our testing protocols to be different and for testing to be more and more available, easier and easier to get at.

The University of Minnesota announced further changes to the current grading system for the fall and spring semesters in a systemwide email sent Wednesday.

The changes come in response to advocacy by the Minnesota Student Association, and will allow undergraduate students on the Twin Cities campus to switch to or from the pass/fail grading system for the fall semester through early January. These changes will also be available for spring semester.

Students intending to make these changes should email One Stop Student Services from Jan. 4 – Jan. 6, 2021.

Following feedback from students throughout the fall semester, the approved resolution makes it so courses taken S/N, or pass/fail will count toward all graduation and program requirements, given that students earn a qualifying grade, Vice President and Provost Rachel Croson said in the email.

The new changes also dictate that any courses taken S/N through the fall or spring semesters will not count towards the total number of S/N courses allowed to be taken within undergraduate programs.

Consistent with other grading changes made earlier this fall, any grades of “F” will automatically be changed to a grade of “N” instead. The circumstances of the fall and spring semesters will also be noted on undergraduate transcripts, according to the email.

Croson urged students to consider the effect of changing their course grading on future semesters. Students may visit the One Stop COVID-19 frequently asked questions page for more guidance.

“As this choice may affect longer-term outcomes (e.g., admission to post-baccalaureate education, employment) as well as current outcomes like financial aid and scholarship eligibility, eligibility for the Dean’s list, athletic eligibility, intra-college transfers, accreditation, licensure and certifications (among others), I strongly urge students to become informed about the consequences of their choices,” reads the email.

This is a breaking news report. More information may be added as it becomes available.