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A Williamsburg-based advocacy group organized a protest Saturday, Aug. 29, to hold a seven minute moment of silence for Jacob Blake, who was shot in the back seven times by police Officer Rustin Sheskey. Students and community members safely gathered on the streets of Richmond Rd. and Jamestown Rd to participate in a sit-in. Cars were redirected by the Williamsburg Police Department. Protest organizers put appropriate physical distance measures in place by protest organizers, marking out places six feet apart for participants to stand at to ensure the safety of all involved and comply with campus COVID-19 regulations.
Following the murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and other individuals who have died at the hands of police brutality, the national conversation regarding police brutality and institutional racism in the United States was amplified. This movement has been sustained on national and local levels over the past few months through the efforts of community organizers and individuals who have remained engaged in the issue, despite decreased mainstream media coverage.
In the Williamsburg community, the Williamsburg Action and Peaceful Protests Williamsburg groups have emerged as leaders and organizers of local advocacy efforts by planning public protests, including the one seen last Saturday, disseminating anti-racist material, and guiding efforts to contact local, state, and national leaders.
The Williamsburg Action group has organized various protests throughout the past few months and has also shared important information about engaging in antiracist advocacy.
They have also collaborated with the 757 StudentAthlete Coalition for Social Change to organize a Unity Walk with SAAC representatives from W&M, Hampton, Christopher Newport, Old Dominion, Virginia Wesleyan and Norfolk St.
NEWS BRIEF BY MAGGIE MANSON / FLAT HAT POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT
A THOUSAND WORDS
CORRECTIONS AND NOTICES
MATT LOWRIE / THE FLAT HAT
An article in the Aug. 12 issue, “College history shapes student action, demands for change,” incorrectly stated that Lyon G. Tyler held a position in the Confederate Army. Tyler did not occupy a leadership role in the army, but instead upheld the institution of slavery after the Civil War.
The Flat Hat wishes to correct any fact printed incorrectly. Corrections may be submitted in email to the editor of the section in which the incorrect information was printed. Requests for corrections will be accepted at any time.
The Flat Hat
‘STABILITAS ET FIDES’ | ESTABLISHED OCT. 3, 1911
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ADMINISTRATION
Rowe announces cuts to administrative salaries Changes constitute COVID-19 response plan, evoke student reactions
AIDAN WHITE
FLAT HAT STAFF WRITER
Five months after evacuating students due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the College of William and Mary’s administration has announced a plan of action to offset the economic effects of the pandemic at the College. Part of the plan includes cuts of the salaries of College President Katherine Rowe and two top College administrators. However, some members of the College community expressed discontent that the plan did not do enough to address the needs of the faculty and staff at the College. In a statement released Aug. 11 and signed by Rowe, College Provost Peggy Agouris and Chief Operating Officer Amy Sebring, the administration laid out four steps they will be taking to prepare the College for additional expenditures related to COVID-19. The first of these is leadership salary reductions. Agouris and Sebring will voluntarily reduce their compensation by 12 percent, while Rowe requested a 15 percent salary reduction at the Board of Visitors meeting. Aug. 25. These salary reductions will be in effect until the end of the calendar year.
According to Sebring, these steps were decided on after a decision-making process which involved university leadership, members of Rowe’s cabinet and the Board of Visitors. Sebring said that the process was guided by four principles: preserving the College’s core learning mission, ensuring that university leaders would be the first impacted, protecting College employees who make less than $50,000 annually and focusing on temporary actions.
“The president, provost and myself wanted to take salary reductions that would provide both significant savings and be well above any possible reductions that may have to be asked of other employees,” Sebring said in an email.
However, Sebring also said that the combined four-month salary reductions being taken by Rowe, Agouris and herself will only yield about $55,116 in savings for the College. For context, President Rowe earned $671,621 last year according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch, while Agouris has an annual salary of $400,000 and Sebring has an annual salary of $330,000 according to the Washington Post. According to OpenPayrolls.com, the average salary of College employees in 2019 was $77,286. The statement also announced a voluntary furlough program, new retirement resources for employees and temporary reassignments, which will involve 50 or more employees being reassigned to areas including business operations, communications and emergency management.
Ten days after these first four steps were announced, the university suggested via mass email that any further furloughs or lay-offs would be the result of individual student failure to adhere to COVID-19 guidelines.
“Do not be the reason that valued W&M employees are furloughed or lose their jobs,” Dean of Students S. Marjorie Thomas said in an email sent to students Aug. 21.
— Aida Campos “
When compared to other public universities in Virginia, Rowe’s administration is implementing higher salary cuts than similar schools. For example, University of Virginia President Jim Ryan is only taking a 10 percent reduction of his $1,188,910 annual salary, while Virginia Commonwealth University announced that President Michael Rao will be among those furloughed if employee furloughs become necessary, according to the Richmond-Times Dispatch.
The initial steps announced by the College come nearly two months after the William & Mary Worker’s Union publicly called for the salaries of Rowe and other top administrators to be reduced by 20 percent. They also called for the College to rehire the non-tenure-eligible faculty whose contracts are not being renewed this year, which includes all of the College’s language house international fellows. According to the union, a year-long 20 percent reduction in Rowe’s salary alone would cover the stipends of four international fellows and the salary of at least one NTE position.
“We’re very concerned about the administration’s plan for workers in the coming year,” graduate worker and union’s organizing committee member Frances Bell said. “They’ve told us several things during the summer that sound very positive and then when you get into them they’re actually very limited.”
One such concern of Bell and the union is that the College’s promise to protect employees who make less than $50,000 a year only applies to salaried employees and not to those who are paid hourly wages. They also take issue with the administration’s repeated slogan of “chop from the top.” The administration began using this phrase over the summer to stress that when considering expenditures to cut, they will focus on larger expenditures and salaries first. However, Bell says that the administration’s policies do not actually reflect that.
“‘Chop from the top’ is very limited,” Bell said. “It only applies to university-wide actions, and so that means that staff can actually be furloughed or given pay cuts at the departmental level without any of their bosses having to take cuts first.”
Sebring declined to comment whether university leadership considered public activism on behalf of groups like the Workers’ Union when developing the first steps announced Aug. 11.
Aida Campos ’20, a recent graduate who co-founded UndocuTribe — now renamed WMFIRE — and served as the editor-in-chief of Underground magazine, was also disappointed with the initial steps laid out by the College. She said that some students feel that President Rowe’s salary reduction is performative and that the voluntary furlough program does little to actually help the College community.
“The system is prioritizing someone who is the public face of the university rather than the people who keep the school running,” Campos said. “When we’re asking people to volunteer to be furloughed, or we’re not letting them know and just laying them off, it’s very clear that we need to rethink who we’re valuing.”
PARKING
College issues new parking, transportation policies for fall Plan redesignates lots across campus, outlines expanded shuttle routes
OLIVIA KOENIG
FLAT HAT STAFF WRITER
One of the many changes occurring at the College of William and Mary for the fall semester is an array of updates to on-campus parking and transportation.
Announced to students and staff via email and the College’s website, one of the most notable changes includes the reallocation of 154 total to visitor parking spots, including 25 spaces in the Morton Hall lot, 25 spaces in Dawson Circle, and 35 spaces in the Old Dominion Hall lot, all popular and often hotly contested parking spaces during the school year. These new visitor spaces will be managed through the Passport parking application, with additional in-person kiosks available for payment, and will also be used for departmental visitors and guests.
Along with these changes, other changes include a redesignation of the Zable Stadium lot from resident parking to solely faculty and staff parking. Additionally, residents in the Graduate Complex will no longer be permitted to utilize the second and third levels of the parking deck on Ukrop Way. The new changes also outline expanded in-house shuttle routes complementary to WATA’s Green Line service. Parking and Transportation aimed to create two shuttle lines that will best serve the College community by forming routes that accessed the most indemand locations at peak times of use. The weekly late-night services will be discontinued; however, students at the College will still enjoy free service with their student identifications. The updated shuttle routes now include service from the Graduate Complex to the School of Education.
Daniel Speer ’22 recently accepted a position with the Parking Appeals Ccommittee and works for Parking and Transportation as a mobility driver. He is hopeful that the expanded service to the School of Education will encourage more students to buy Long-Term Storage decals and decrease the number of cars on the main campus of the College.
“No late-night service is going to hurt grads, even though it serves the Grad complex still”, Speer said. “I’m personally glad it will run to the School of Ed again, because I can ride it to the Lot 3 Long-Term storage lot if I have my car.”
Parking and Transportation has a longstanding, often contentious relationship with the student body. Many students are raising concerns over the continuous decrease in available parking spots throughout campus, the costs of parking decals and accessibility issues. These recent changes have come with pushback from students — especially on social media.
Joe Tapia ’21 expressed his frustrations with Parking and Transportation on the Collegerelated meme page, “Swampy Memes for Twampy Teens.” Tapia emailed William Horacio, director of Parking and Transportation services, inquiring about any planned discounts on parking decals as a result of the delayed move-in dates, and shared his frustration with the changes, as well as his negative experiences with on-campus parking in the past. “My experience with parking echoes that of many other students’ experiences; there never seems to be enough priority for those students who desperately need vehicles,” Tapia said. “The current pricing model incentivizes students to not own vehicles, and punishes those with vehicles. Every aspect of campus life should further enhance the student experience, and in so many ways W&M fails at this.”
Director of Parking and Transportation services William Horacio described how thus far, these changes have been fairly well received. He explained how parking services throughout campus are continuing to evolve, and many changes are yet to come.
“This is only the first phase of a much more elaborate adjustment to the parking system,” Horacio said. “It is the most comprehensive change in over 25 years. The next phase aims to eliminate some practices that are not in line with the best use of the limited inventory of spaces, and ultimately we aim to restore an element of choice to our customers.”
Horacio continued by stressing the financial support that is necessary from parking revenue. The various fees required for purchasing a parking pass is used for funding a variety of auxiliary services associated with the College. Additionally, Horacio clarified interim policies towards parking relating to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Service has been put on hold until we are able to transport fuller loads,” Horacio said. “Our COVID response posture only allows us to transport a maximum of 3 passengers. This limit renders the service inefficient and impractical to run at this time.”
Panel provides updates regarding new monument to enslaved people
Lemon Project showcases final design, discusses timeline for Old Campus memorial
LEMON PROJECT from page 1
“We’re hoping that the Memorial will serve as a new pathway and a new welcoming to the campus ...” Glover said.
The committee hopes the memorial will act as not only a site of remembrance, but also a site of gathering.
Allen said that she envisions the space as a new site of tradition for students, one for gatherings, studying, poetry readings and ceremonies. For descendants of those who were enslaved by the College, Allen said it will be a space for them, too.
Though they did not offer specifics on programming for the use of the memorial, the panelists emphasized that the memorial would be more than just a structure.
“The entire process has also been backed by the idea that the memorial is not the only thing,” Kern said. “A physical memorial is only part of scholarships, of courses, of endowed professors, of institutes that study this history. It is the beginning of memorialization, but it certainly isn’t the end of this conversation.”
Pease then expanded on the planned educational programming surrounding the new memorial, mentioning that the committee hopes to put together an exhibition that showcases all the submissions that were received in the competition. He also noted the significant number of tourists and visitors that will visit the memorial.
“So often, when a visitor or a tourist comes to a place like W&M, it is so easy to see it as this beautiful park-like campus and wonderful buildings,” Pease said. “The memorial weaves more of a complete history together.”
With historic campus remaining largely unchanged for centuries, the panelists emphasized both the necessity of the memorial as well as the fact that it is long overdue.
“The campus right now reflects the population, in terms of the iconography, of the 18th and 19th centuries,” Allen said. “The people on campus now — it’s a much more diverse group of people and the landscape should reflect that. It says, ‘these 186 people who lived and toiled at W&M for no compensation for 172 years must be remembered.’ That’s what this does — it remembers them; it acknowledges them; it humanizes them.”
