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(Austonia staff)
The University of Texas-Austin continued its march toward a new normal on Friday, as university President Gregory Fenves marked his last day of leadership after five years in office—the final two months of it dominated by sweeping pandemic-era changes on campus.
<p>As he heads to Atlanta to lead Emory University, Fenves passes the torch on Monday to Interim President Jay Hartzell, dean of the McCombs School of Business, who takes the helm just three months before classes start on Aug. 26. </p><p><br/></p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
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<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">Greg Fenves</small><small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="Add Photo Credit...">(Marsha Miller/University of Texas)</small>
</p><p><br/></p><p>Hartzell faces a term marked by new protocols aimed at containing the spread of COVID-19 among students, faculty and staff on campus. University officials said that the transition, even in such uncertain times, is expected to be smooth. </p><p>"Even though this is a challenging time for higher education nationally, UT-Austin has prepared well for the transition in leadership to President <em>ad interim</em> Hartzell," Kevin P. Eltife, chairman of the UT System Board of Regents, told Austonia on Thursday, saying he has "full support" of the university leadership.</p><p>Depending on his own plans and how long it takes university officials to name a permanent replacement, Hartzell will almost certainly also be called upon to play the roles of politician and advocate in the Texas Capitol, just two miles away, when UT faces budget cuts during the Legislature next year.</p><p>But officials say Hartzell's immediate mission is to ensure the campus is ready for its approximately 40,000 students to return to a safe, productive learning environment that is as valuable as it was before the pandemic caused so many changes. </p><p><br/></p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
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<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">Jay Hartzell</small><small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="Add Photo Credit...">(University of Texas)</small></p><p><br/></p><p>"Our number-one goal at this time is to ensure that UT institutions are prepared to educate students, serve patients and conduct critical research in environments safe for students, faculty and staff," UT System Chancellor James B. Milliken told Austonia on Thursday. "[Hartzell] has very successfully led one of the largest colleges on campus, and for the last couple of months, he has been involved in all major decisions as the institution navigates the challenges of the pandemic and budget reductions. We need this kind of experienced leadership in the months ahead." </p><p>Neither Fenves nor Hartzell were available to comment this week. </p><p>The news that Fenves was leaving came less than two weeks after the university officially closed to contain the spread of coronavirus. It capped a term marked by success in financial aid and graduation rates, and no headline-grabbing scandals or damaging public infighting.</p><p>His announcement was a surprise to many because Fenves' candidacy at Emory, whose president vacated the role late last year, was not made public until both universities made official announcements on April 7. </p><p>It was not long after Maurie McInnis, then the provost, <a href="https://thedailytexan.com/2020/03/26/executive-vice-president-and-provost-maurie-mcinnis-leaving-ut-austin" target="_blank">said she would leave </a>at the end of the semester to become president of Stony Brook University.</p><p>Even Hartzell expressed surprise at his new role, joking last month that he was hurrying to organize his office so the new dean of McCombs, Lillian Mills, could easily take over when he moves to the tower leadership offices.</p><p>Fenves wasn't specific about his reasons for the move, but given the nature of the two vastly different jobs, Fenves likely heads to higher pay, better decision-making control, more privacy, less meddling by politicians and an overall less-public role at the prominent private research university in Georgia. </p><p>Former UT Chancellor Mark Yudof describes the post as "a great job," but one that is highly accountable to taxpayers, lawmakers, and the media in several ways—particularly as it comes to campus policies and budgeting. </p><p>Testifying before the state Legislature and fighting for funding, for example, is a vital part of the role—one Yudof relished, as a lawyer who spent his career at public institutions. By contrast, the focus of private school leadership tends to more "inward" on education and internal campus issues, he said. </p><p>"It's very different," said Yudof, who served as president of the University of California after UT. "I've never held a high post in a private school, but I did for a time think about whether I should make the move."</p>
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Amie Jean graduates from McCombs School of Business on Saturday. (Amie Jean)
When Amie Jean won her election as student body vice president at the University of Texas-Austin last year, the career-driven business school senior saw it as her chance to enjoy campus life for her last few months as a student.
<p>Then campus life went away, shut down by the pandemic. But even more alarming was what disappeared with it: The long list of career prospects she had been lining up with years of hard work, networking and resume building. </p><p>The irony hasn't escaped Jean, 22, who graduates from the McCombs School of Business on Saturday in a virtual commencement ceremony for the University of Texas.</p><p>But she's trying to maintain a positive outlook about the uncertain future.</p><p>"If we all don't know, then at least I'm not alone," she said with a laugh.</p><p>Economists mince no words about what college graduates face: The economic crash that followed the shutdown left behind an economy at its weakest since the Great Depression, with a national unemployment rate of 14.7% and a Texas unemployment rate at 12.8%, the state's worst on record, according to U.S. labor statistics released Friday.</p><p>"The job prospects are dismal at the moment," said Michael Sadler, senior finance lecturer and economist at McCombs, adding that the few openings are not in entry-level fields. "Many of my students at UT have had job offers revoked or deferred, and those that were going to internships have seen those canceled."</p><p>Experts also predict that students graduating in a recession are also likely to make less money in the long term.</p><p>"Exactly when you graduate, and the existing economic conditions at the time, has permanent effects on earnings over the lifetime of an individual," Sadler said. </p><p>Charlotte Gorman, 26, who is getting her master's degree Saturday from UT's LBJ School of Public Affairs, hopes that working for the government will insulate her from the pay issues and job insecurity.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzMxMDg1Mi9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY0NjYyODIwMn0.oyEZ2wRBxHL5R29b0Pbuz3vx30OsTOD5ZhrogL__Tx0/img.jpg?width=980" id="cb9f7" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="50c42b4dad8c7f9859c493ba899ca198" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">Charlotte Gorman is graduating from the LBJ School. (Charlotte Gorman)</small></p><p><br/></p><p>She snapped up a one-year fellowship in Washington D.C. in March when she realized that job opportunities were drying up. They have told her it will happen, she said, though the start date has been delayed.</p><p>"I don't know what things will look like a year from now," she said, "but I will at least have a year of experience under my belt rather than being fresh out of school."</p><p>At placement company Express Employment Systems in Austin, owner and recruiter Mark Wagner has heard from more student job seekers since the shutdown. He's also seen fewer companies hiring talent with no job openings—a common corporate strategy to keep good people away from competitors.</p><p>It's a practice he said likely won't come back soon, maybe not until a vaccine is found. </p><p>The rebound can't come soon enough for Shelby Evans, who gets her master's degree in public affairs on Saturday.</p><p>Calls and informational interviews with prospective employers dried up in March, she said. Now, she is watching her sizeable student loan balance gathering interest while she job hunts.</p><p>"I am sure things will get back to normal, and it's just a matter of when," Evans said. "But 'when' really matters when you have a bunch of debt." </p>
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(Maria Dominguez)
Maria Dominguez, an award-winning former public school bilingual teacher, cashed in her life savings in December to open her tiny day care to a handful of kids in a remodeled home in North Austin.
<p>Just three months later, amid fears of the coronavirus and a declining attendance due to the pandemic, her <a href="https://www.cielitolindopreschool.com/" target="_blank">Cielito Lindo</a> Spanish immersion preschool closed its doors. </p><p>To save her day care, a lifelong dream of hers, Dominquez will reopen it on Monday, even as state <a href="https://www.texastribune.org/2020/04/29/texas-restaurant-and-retail-employees-go-back-work-without-child-care/" target="_blank">health officials only allow </a>her to accept students whose parents are deemed essential workers. </p><p>Dominguez hopes their tuition, which she has not charged while offering lessons online for free, will be enough. Five children are coming back, she said, about half of her earlier enrollment.</p><p>"As a business, there are expenses that are still happening, regardless of whether you're open or if you have income or not," said Dominguez, who took no business loans to open but qualified for a $1,000 disaster loan.</p><p>As governments closed businesses across communities to avoid the virus' spread, child care centers were allowed to stay open to serve essential workers. </p><p>But that still meant bringing in less than half the tuition dollars while paying operating costs, as well as increased expenses from new health regulations.</p><p>Open Door Preschools, which once took care of 200 children in three locations in Austin, closed in March and reopened one location on April 6 to serve children of essential workers, executive director Cynthia Smith McCollum said. The staff expected about 26 kids to come back under those rules, she said. Their attendance is less than half that.</p><p>"We've got about 5% of our regular attendance right now," McCollum said.</p><p>A bigger worry for Dominguez, who lives at the home-based day care with her husband and daughter, was the health of her own family, her employee and that of her eight students. She closed on March 25.</p><p>"At that point we just didn't know where all of this was headed and how big it would turn out to be," she said. </p><p>It wasn't a small decision. </p><p>A <a href="https://www.naeyc.org/sites/default/files/globally-shared/downloads/PDFs/our-work/public-policy-advocacy/state_by_state_child_care_crisis_coronavirus_surveydata.pdf" target="_blank">survey of day care centers</a> in Texas, taken on the day Dominguez closed her doors, showed that more than a quarter worried they wouldn't be able to reopen if they closed for any length of time. </p><p>Another quarter of them thought they could last two weeks, and another 21% weren't sure how long they could survive, according to the survey by the National Association for the Education of Young Children. </p><p>"It's been tough out there," said David Feigen of Texans Care for Children, a child advocacy group. </p><p>His organization hopes the state will quickly resolve the issue of day care for workers in nonessential jobs, whose employers will be allowed to reopen in a limited capacity on May 1, but whose children are still not allowed in day care centers.</p><p>Even then, however, the loss of income, reported by three-quarters of the survey respondents in Texas, will be insurmountable for many, Feigen said. </p><p>Advocates are pushing for financial assistance for the child care system, warning that if there isn't sufficient support for these centers now, there will be no one to take care of the kids when Texas workers come back in full force.</p><p>"If we want to rebuild the economy, we need to make sure child care is still there," Feigen said. </p><p><a href="https://frontlinechildcare.texas.gov/" target="_blank">Find Texas day care information here.</a></p>
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