From the Hill, September/October 2020

CAMPUS NEWS From the Hill Testing, Public Health Efforts Mark Cornell’s COVID-Era Return This summer, as the University prepared low incidence of the virus: of the nearly they’re coming from. (For more details on to welcome students back to the Hill, it took 1,000 faculty and staff and more than 3,200 the reopening plan and the rationale be numerous steps to try to ensure safety, students (two-thirds of whom were grad hind it, see “From the President” on page 6.) including implementing an in-house testing students and one-third undergrads) tested, The public health campaign includes program for COVID-19 and launching a pub there were only five positives: two from the a website (covid.cornell.edu/smarter) with lic health campaign about the importance of faculty-staff group and three students. “It links to information on the testing program, following preventive guidelines. The testing was important to understand what our cur campus re-entry, the required daily health site, with samples processed by the Vet col rent prevalence was before a lot of students self-assessment, New York State quar lege, has been headquartered at the Fischell came back, and we’re gratified that it’s so antine rules, the value of face masks in Band Center adjacent to Schoellkopf Field. low,” said Gary Koretzky ’78, vice provost for preventing viral spread, the behavioral In early August, University officials report academic integration and professor of med compact for students, and much more. The ed that initial results had indicated a very icine at Weill Cornell. “It’s clear that most University has also produced education people are being careful, and we want to al posters and floor decals on such topics encourage that to continue.” as elevator etiquette, mask protocols, and The University has also outlined its social distancing. “It’s critical that we as a testing plan for fall, which has three com community do all we can to create an envi ponents: arrival testing of all students ronment that does not create added risk as part of their re-entry to campus; test for the more vulnerable among us,” said ing anyone in the Cornell community who Timothy Marchell ’82, BS ’83, director of has symptoms of COVID-19 or has been in the Skorton Center for Health Initiatives close contact with someone who does; and at Cornell Health. “The public health cam “surveillance testing,” in which students, paign sets the stage for that shared effort by faculty, and staff are tested at regular communicating expectations, increasing intervals. Additionally, the University knowledge, and calling upon everyone in SURVEILLANCE SYSTEM: COVID testing at the Fischell Band Center. Top: Signs promoting safer behavior have has established quarantine guidelines for the Cornell community to do the right thing been posted throughout campus, including on Ho Plaza. returning students, depending on where during this global pandemic.” PHOTOS: DAVE TOP, BURBANK; BOTTOM, JASON KOSKI/UREL 10 CORNELL ALUMNI MAGAZINE SO20_fth_PROOF__JBOK.indd 10 8/17/20 4:05 PM UC Davis Prof Tapped as CALS Dean An environmental scientist from the Did You Know . University of California, Davis, has been named the new dean of CALS. Benjamin That the University is digit Houlton (left), director of the John Muir izing its renowned Insect Institute of the Environment and a pro Collection? Established in fessor of global environmental studies at 1871, it boasts 7 million spec Davis, takes office on October 1. Houlton— imens representing 200,000 whose research topics include ways to species—about a quarter of stem climate change and to improve those on Earth. Staff are now carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus cycles for energy and food creating an online database production—will also hold professorial appointments in ecolo of the holdings, including gy and evolutionary biology and in global development. “Ben’s high-resolution images. leadership, scholarship, and research experience meshes per fectly with CALS’ commitment to an interdisciplinary culture and a deeply held belief that effecting meaningful change requires a holistic, systems-based approach to problem- solving,” says Provost Michael Kotlikoff. Houlton succeeds ‘We’ve got to be agile enough Kathryn Boor ’80, who will become dean of the Graduate School to react to anything that and vice provost for graduate education upon Houlton’s arrival. might happen.’ — NHL commissioner Gary Bettman ’74, speaking to NPR about how the league is protecting players CU Financial Crunch: An Update from COVID-19 now that games have resumed In early July, President Martha Pollack and Provost Kotlikoff shared an update on the University’s finances, which have been battered by the COVID-19 pandemic. As they reported, the Ithaca and Cornell Tech campuses suffered a $45 million impact in the Give My Regards to . fiscal year that ended on June 30—and $210 million is projected These Cornellians in the news for 2020–21. “Among the factors contributing to this fiscal impact, the largest is a significant anticipated increase in financial aid demand, resulting from the economic dislocation of many fami (left), named president lies as a result of the current crisis,” they wrote. “We remain fully Irving McPhail ’70 of St. Augustine’s University, a historically committed to meeting the financial aid need of our students, even Black institution in Raleigh, North Carolina. in this challenging time. An additional, important component is , assistant professor of the extra costs that are associated with our taking steps to try to Jeffrey Palmer performing and media arts, nominated for provide the safest possible experience for our staff, faculty, and an Emmy for outstanding documentary students this coming year while a vaccine for COVID-19 is still or nonfiction series for his fil N. Scott not available.” Momaday: Words From a Bear, part of PBS’s “American Masters” series. The winners will be announced September 20. Pollack and Kotlikoff went on to describe the measures the University will take to address the shortfall; they come in Attorney Brooke Pinto ’14 (right), elected addition to actions announced in March, including salary and to represent Ward 2 on the city council of Washington, D.C. At age twenty-eight, she’s hiring freezes, suspending capital projects, restricting travel and the district’s youngest-ever councillor. discretionary spending, shifting fundraising focus from endow ment to current use, and adopting voluntary salary reductions by Literary scholar Jonathan senior leadership, faculty, and staff. (Pollack has cut her own sal Culler (left), the Class of 1916 Professor of English ary by 20 percent for a year.) “These actions enabled us to balance and Comparative Literature the FY20 budget, and are projected also to produce approximate and a member of the ly $110 million toward the budget deficit for FY21,” they wrote, Cornell faculty since 1977, elected to membership in “leaving a gap of approximately $100 million.” The new measures the British Academy. include a retirement incentive program; an increased endow ment payout; a shift in philanthropy efforts toward fundraising Ray Jayawardhana (right), dean of Arts and Sciences and professor of astronomy, awarded for current needs; temporary reductions in retirement contribu the Carl Sagan Medal by the American tions (for endowed units) and salaries (for statutory units); and Astronomical Society for excellence in public voluntary reduced hours for faculty and staff. communication in planetary science. PHOTOS: HOULTON, KARIN HIGGINS/UC DAVIS; INSECTS, JUSTIN JAMES MUIR; MCPHAILAND PINTO, PROVIDED; CULLER, ROBERT BARKER/UREL; JAYAWARDHANA, CHRIS KITCHEN SEPTEMBER | OCTOBER 2020 11 SO20_fth_PROOF__JBOK.indd 11 8/17/20 4:05 PM CAMPUS NEWS Center Releases Polls on Black America Foundation Honors Late ER Physician In honor of the Black Lives Matter movement, Cornell’s Roper A nonprofit has been established in Center for Public Opinion Research has made publicly available memory of a Cornellian physician more than eighty years of surveys of Black Americans and U.S. who died by suicide in the midst of the attitudes about African Americans. The collection, entitled “Say COVID pandemic in New York City. Their Names. Hear Their Voices,” is presented with context about Lorna Breen ’92 (left), whose story was race in polling over the years. Found at ropercenter.cornell.edu, covered widely in the national media it comprises such topics as views in the mid-1940s about African following her death, was the ER direc Americans moving into white neighborhoods and recent polls tor of NewYork-Presbyterian’s Allen about police violence in the wake of the killing of George Floyd. Hospital in Upper Manhattan. Having coped with overwhelming While the Roper Center’s data is generally available only to mem numbers of sick patients—and recovered from COVID herself— bers, anyone can request access to the surveys from the new Breen suffered a mental health crisis; she sought psychiatric collection via e-mail. Says government professor Peter Enns, the treatment, but, tragically, took her own life. Friends and family center’s executive director: “This project will help ensure that have since established the Dr. Lorna Breen Heroes Foundation, today’s scholars and future generations remember these voices.” with the aim of providing mental health support to medical work ers. “Like Lorna, physicians and healthcare providers suffer from a critically high degree of burnout and stress,” the foundation says ‘I’m hoping that, now more than on its website. “Currently, more than one physician in the United States dies by suicide every day.” In addition to being an under ever, people will be on board to grad alumna, Breen was enrolled in Cornell’s executive MBA-MS see that change needs to happen.’ program in healthcare leadership as a member of its Class of 2021. — Michelle Duguid, PhD ’08, the Johnson School’s new associate dean for diversity, inclusion, and belonging Racial Equity Efforts Continue In a follow-up to her pledge to make the University more just and equitable in response to the nation’s racial reckoning spurred by the Black Lives Matter movement, in mid-July President Pollack + offered an update on the changes planned for campus.

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