On September 7, the Tulane
University campus in New Orleans
is covered by floodwaters following
Hurricane Katrina. (Photo courtesy of David J. Phillip/AP Wide World Photos)
WHEN HURRICANE KATRINA hit the Gulf Coast
of the United States in August,
Angelo DeNisi had been dean of the
A.B. Freeman School of Business at
Tulane University in New Orleans
for just under two months. But
Katrina’s arrival wasn’t just an overwhelming test of leadership for one
new dean. School administrators in
Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama
have had to cope with the devastation and flooding caused by Katrina
and her aftermath. Some schools sustained minimal damage and soon
reopened. Others, particularly those
in New Orleans, were forced to shut
down as they faced a city in tumult, a
student body scattered, and a host of
questions about what happens next.
These schools moved quickly to
set up blogs, chat groups, and emergency websites to keep students,
staff, and faculty informed and connected. “What everyone wanted
most was to know whether everyone
was safe,” says J. Patrick O’Brien,
dean of the College of Business
Administration at Loyola University
New Orleans. In fact, the near-miraculous power of the Internet has
allowed these schools to regroup
their administrative teams, working
from multiple sites in far-flung cities
to communicate, plan their next
moves, and even hold a semblance of
a fall semester online.
One of the first orders of business
for these schools was to reassure students that they would not be forgotten and faculty that they were still
employed. For instance, at the
University of New Orleans, full-time
faculty were told they would be paid
at least through the end of the fiscal
year. Adjunct faculty received salaries
through September 30 and some
were rehired on a case-by-case basis,
particularly those who could conduct
classes online.
The University of Southern
Mississippi in Hattiesburg not only
guaranteed faculty a payroll, it
worked with FEMA to help find
housing and other necessities for staff
members whose homes were
destroyed. “We’re trying to keep
people engaged in their lives and
moving forward,” says Harold Doty,
dean of the College of Business.
A major goal for all affected universities has been helping their students find places at other academic
institutions. Many Loyola students
were able to enroll as transient students at other Jesuit universities, and
thousands enrolled in Louisiana’s
state university system. In fact,
according to Paul Hensel, interim
dean of the University of New
Orleans’ College of Business
Administration, so many UNO students enrolled at Louisiana State
University in Baton Rouge that some
UNO faculty began teaching LSU
classes to help with the overflow.
But schools across the country
and around the world have offered
academic homes to the evacuated
students, either waiving tuition altogether or charging only a minimal
fee. “I want to thank sincerely all
those universities that have opened
their arms to our students,” says
Hensel. “We’ve got students at
Brown, Oklahoma State, Southern
Illinois University in Carbondale, and
North Texas State. I have six French speaking students here from Africa,
and the University of Montreal wanted to take them in.”
Southern Mississippi is one of the
dozens of schools that have accepted
displaced scholars as “visiting students.” Although the Gulfport campus sustained enough damage to be
closed at least for the semester, the
Hattiesburg campus was up and running again in early September and
poised to hold a full semester of
classes.
According to Doty, “I’ve declared
that any student who was enrolled in
higher education at the start of the
semester will be admitted. That’s
without benefit of transcripts. We’re
fudging on some rules, and we know there’s an accreditation issue. But for
these visiting students, we’re willing
to stand up and look three other
AACSB deans in the eye and explain
our decision.”
Educators realize it will be an
administrative nightmare to determine which students have earned
credit where. “We are committed to
being as flexible as we can to make
sure that any relevant course a student takes during this semester can
be counted as credit toward the student’s degree,” says DeNisi. “It will
be a huge task, but it’s what we have
to do.”
In some cases, students didn’t
have to continue their education
elsewhere: Some hurricane-ravaged
universities were able to quickly start
offering courses electronically. By
mid-September, UNO as a whole
had more than 50 classes online, and
more were being readied every
week. Says Hensel, “We have a Web
site where students can sign up for
online classes, and we’ll have rolling
enrollments. Classes have to be finished by December 31, but that’s
easier to do online where students
are self-paced.”
At Loyola, the majority of CBA
classes were made available online,
commencing in late September.
Meanwhile, the school was dealing
with its other challenges. “By one
week after the hurricane hit, we had
laid out action plans for all faculty
and staff members—teaching of
online courses, revision of five-year
faculty development plans, continuation of the development of assessment programs for each of the
majors, revisions of syllabi to reflect
assessment plans, and individual
research,” says O’Brien. “We also
announced to the faculty and staff
that it was our full intention to reopen for classes in January 2006.”
That’s the goal for administrators
at all of the disrupted schools, but to
some extent, the decision is out of
their hands. Doty hopes to move
back into the Gulfport campus for
the spring semester—if the city is
able to supply power, water, and
other services. “Right now, we have
not made a decision about the
spring semester,” he says. “We have
to take care of our students and
community first.”
While Tulane University sustained
minor damage, most can be repaired
with relative ease. For the campus to
open in January, DeNisi expects the
university will have to provide some
housing and other services on its
own. “Right now, this is all under
discussion,” he says.
At UNO, the early focus was on a
branch campus that survived the
flood better than the main campus.But even that building won’t be
holding classes unless the city of New
Orleans is habitable again, and when
that will happen is anybody’s guess.
“We’ve heard estimates of everywhere from two months to eight
months to never,” says Hensel.
Yet an even longer-term problem
looms on the horizon: the fates of
the affected universities in the coming years. Next year’s classes may be
considerably smaller as some temporarily displaced students choose to
stay where they are, and other students under recruitment decide not
to chance a Gulf Coast school.
“We are currently recruiting students at all levels for 2006,” says
DeNisi. “We realize this may be difficult. We realize some of our students won’t return. But we believe
that if we can deal with problems in
a compassionate way, help students
graduate on time, and actually get
things running again soon, we will
demonstrate that Tulane is a caring
and capable organization. It may
take a year or two, but if we can
learn anything from dealing with this
crisis, Tulane will come back a better
university than it was.”
O’Brien of Loyola echoes these
sentiments. “Katrina will surely test
our abilities to manage change and
adapt to a new, uncertain environment. It is our intention to resurrect with a stronger, more focused
institution.”
Hensel not only expresses confidence that his school will recover,
but he also predicts that the city will
rebuild. “How can you not have
New Orleans?” he asks. “We’ve got
to focus on the positive. That’s what
we tell our students, that’s what we
tell our faculty, that’s what we tell
ourselves. We’ve got things to do.
Let’s get to work.”