Politics, public health collide at UW schools
Campuses adapt during uncertainty as fall nears
Colleges across the state are working to reevaluate on-campus masking policies in the weeks leading up to the start of the fall semester, as new national data on the delta variant’s spread among vaccinated people, updated masking recommendations and political pressure further complicate a quickly evolving situation.
The new recommendation from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention states people in areas with “high” or “substantial” COVID-19 transmission should wear masks indoors regardless of vaccination status.
University of Wisconsin campuses have thus far been working toward the fall semester without a systemwide vaccination or mask mandate, and some are comparing the uncertainty surrounding the fall to that of one year before.
Throughout the pandemic, UW System schools have followed CDC guidelines, and onlookers say they have no reason to suspect campuses would not do the same given the new CDC recommendations.
UW-Milwaukee last week led the charge to adjust to the new guidelines, announcing it would require masks in all campus buildings. As of Sunday, Milwaukee and Waukesha counties had high levels of transmission, according to the CDC’s website, and Washington County had substantial
transmission. UW-Milwaukee has satellite campuses in the two suburban counties.
Now, a proposal by state Sen. Steven Nass, R-Whitewater, is adding to the uncertainty and raising questions about how political influences could still stand to hamper the UW System’s fall planning.
If passed, Nass’ motion would direct the UW Board of Regents to issue its COVID-19 policies as emergency rules subject to legislative approval. The Republican-controlled rules committee, which Nass co-chairs, could then block part or all of those rules.
The senator pointed to public health measures including “newly announced Covid-19 mandates such as requiring healthy unvaccinated students submit to weekly Covid-19 testing, requiring students to submit their Covid-19 vaccination status and pending announcements on mandatory masking,” as the reason for his proposal.
“Unfortunately, some chancellors in the UW System consider themselves mini-Andrea Palms not beholden to following state law and moving quickly to take advantage of the Delta-variant hysteria to enact excessive COVID-19 mandates,” Nass said, referring to the former Wisconsin DHS secretary-designee who was never confirmed by the state Senate and now serves as health and human services deputy secretary at the federal level.
All four Democrats on the rules committee came out against his motion. Two Republicans in addition to Nass said they supported the plan, leaving three Republicans who have not yet said whether they would vote for or against it. The committee is expected to vote remotely on the motion Tuesday.
Opponents throughout the UW System say the change, if passed, would at least slow down the system’s reaction time by requiring an added layer of legislative approval for any COVID-19 protocol. At worst, they fear, it would end public health efforts like mask mandates altogether, leaving schools without the tools they used to curb COVID-19’s spread last school year.
“I feel like in some ways, going into this fall is actually worse than March 2020 or going into last fall, because at this point, things have been so politicized, people are so tired,” said Tracy Hawkins, chair of the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater’s faculty senate. “(The pandemic) is not just a blip anymore. It has been a substantial portion of people’s college experience now. So it’s like the emotions of it are running even higher.”
Proposal ‘biggest threat’ to an in-person fall
Data on COVID-19 spread across Wisconsin was quickly evolving throughout last week.
By late Sunday, more than half of UW campuses were in counties with high or substantial transmission, according to the CDC.
UW System officials wrote in a tweet Friday that interim President Tommy Thompson is “aggressively & actively monitoring the COVID-19 situation to prioritize the health & safety of our students, faculty, staff & university communities.”
Last week, the UW System stopped short of reinstating a systemwide mask mandate. In an email to chancellors Wednesday, Thompson instead encouraged campus leaders to review individual policies in consultation with local health officials.
For some, there is growing concern around how the UW System will navigate this latest inflection point in the pandemic, faced with a fatigued public and ever-heightening political scrutiny.
“This is madness,” Rachel Ida Buff, a UW-Milwaukee professor, said last week of the system’s delay in reinstating mask requirements. “And it’s very clear that it’s the UW System’s attempt to balance the very difficult pandemic situation with our equally difficult political situation in the state and that’s understandable, but it’s not acceptable.”
Buff noted that before UWM changed course on its masking rules, faculty were told they could not even require masks in their office hours.
On many campuses, masks remain recommended for unvaccinated people, though critics within faculty and students say the rule is virtually unenforceable. Some, including UW-Madison, are requiring unvaccinated students living in residence halls to regularly test for COVID-19, another precaution that could come under attack under Nass’ proposal, as may UWMilwaukee’s new weekly testing requirement for all unvaccinated employees and students who are not 100% online.
Jon Shelton, vice president of higher education for the AFT-Wisconsin union and a professor at UW-Green Bay, acknowledged that, despite a rise in cases, the country was not back where it was at the height of the pandemic. Even then, he expected campuses would need to respond to changing conditions throughout the school year.
“The idea that we would take away the discretion of UW System and campuses to make these decisions is a public health nightmare,” Shelton said. “You have to allow these institutions who have people literally on the ground in these communities to be able to make the decisions to make their campus community safe.”
In his statement opposing Nass’ proposal, Thompson vowed that the UW System “will continue to use its authority to take nimble and reasonable steps that enable us to keep our campuses open for the education students need, parents expect, and Wisconsin deserves.”
“Given my experience as a former United States Health and Human Services Secretary, I know the biggest threat to in-person classes this fall would be actions that strip the UW System of the tools it has so successfully used to date to address outbreaks and reduce the spread of COVID-19,” the former governor said.
Pandemic fatigue, political fatigue
Across the country, colleges are quickly calculating and changing to meet the new phase of the pandemic while keeping classes in person.
Experts from the American College Health Association to the editor-inchief of the leading journal Science have called for vaccination mandates on college campuses. While UW System schools still have made no indication they would require vaccination against COVID-19 this fall, some 623 campuses nationwide now do, according to the Chronicle of Higher Education.
That, as of last week, includes half of the Big Ten conference, of which UWMadison is a part.
Michigan State University was the latest to impose a mandate on indoor masking and COVID-19 vaccination. President Samuel Stanley Jr. wrote that
CDC data on the delta variant’s spread among vaccinated people was “concerning and significantly shifts the landscape.”
In Wisconsin, Carthage College this month joined Marquette University, Lawrence University and Beloit College in requiring the shot.
Without a vaccine requirement, UW campuses have been working all summer to entice and encourage students to get vaccinated and to report their vaccination status to the schools so they can get a better sense of overall vaccination rates.
Throughout the past year, Republicans have attempted to block the UW System from imposing COVID-19 policies multiple times, even for policies administration officials do not plan to impose in the first place.
That includes legislation that would bar UW schools and technical colleges from requiring students to be tested for COVID-19 or receive a vaccine for COVID-19 as a condition of being on campus.
The bill, which was co-sponsored by Nass but not by any of his Republican colleagues on the rules committee, has not yet made it to the floor for a vote. Another GOP-led bill sought to require parents and guardians be allowed to attend any in-person commencement ceremonies.
Rep. Lisa Subeck, a Democrat who represents the area just to the west of the UW-Madison campus and is on the rules committee, called Nass’ effort a “power grab” and said, “the least Senator Nass could do is to allow an open and honest discussion that engages health experts, university leaders and the students and staff who will be impacted.”
“Senator Nass’ proposal to micromanage health measures put in place by UW System and campus leaders endangers public health on campus and may even jeopardize the ability to return to in-person classes this fall,” Subeck said.
All this political pressure is not lost on faculty and students, as they question why their colleges are taking certain stances on COVID-19 policies.
And for students, who have warily endured the pandemic version of college amid seemingly endless tumult, it’s as if uncertainty has become the only certainty.
Tiara Fountain, a senior pre-law student at UW-Milwaukee, said Friday she was relieved that her school went back to having a mask mandate because she was worried that the delta variant’s spread in Milwaukee may threaten the ability to have in-person classes.
Last year, Fountain watched as her friends who relied on the campus for healthy food, safe housing and reliable work scrambled to find other options after the university shut down.
After all that, she couldn’t bring herself to say she had “complete faith” in her college leaders. She said she’s keeping her mask on no matter what changes, having come to terms with the idea that her decisions are the only thing she can control, beyond hoping the powers that be make the safest choice.
“I feel like with the game of politics and just schools trying to look good for whomever — whether that’s keeping masks on or keeping masks off or whatever they decide — these decisions, they ultimately impact really vulnerable people,” she said.