Emporia State’s Fall Planning Group consists of 24 members, mainly administers, who helped devise the campus reopening plan. Their next open forum is 3-4 p.m. September 24 via Zoom on Hornet TV.

“Every administrator and the like was on (the Fall Planning Group), it was a big group that started meeting in late April,” said Gregory Schnedier, former president of the faculty. “President Garrett set the agenda but if anyone had issues they wanted to talk about (they could),” Schnedier said. “I think that the inclusion of the students through Brayden (Soper) as well as the faculty senate shows that the administration is interested and works well with the shared governance groups.”

Schnedier said that even though only one student was in the group it was working well.

“The issue there is because he is the elected president of the students and is probably one of the few students who would want to join,” Schneider said. “As long as people feel like they are being dealt with fairly, who wants another meeting?”

The group organized to develop a plan in response to Covid-19 and gather the equipment the college would need to reopen.

“(There were) different subgroups and our groups job was to devise some of the items to be addressed from a human resources perspective and buildings perspective,” said William McKernan, director of University Facilities. “I think we did a good job informing people…I appreciate what the rest of campus has done and understanding what the pandemic has done.”

As the education chair for PRIDE, junior elementary education major Emily Howe said the open forums that the planning committee hold could be important to some students. 

“I think that for students that want to be getting their voices out there and giving suggestions it would be something that is really important,” Howe said.

For more information on ESUs reopening strategy visit https://www.emporia.edu/covid-19-information/esu-fall-2020-return-campus/.