Chancellor Harold L. Martin, on His Plan to Safely Open the Nation’s Largest HCBU During COVID-19 – TIME

(Miss this weeks The Leadership Brief? This interview above was delivered to the inbox of Leadership Brief subscribers on Sunday morning, Aug. 23; to receive weekly emails of conversations with the worlds top CEOs and business decisionmakers, click here.)

Education has become as much about logistics as instruction during the COVID-19 crisis, and Harold L. Martin, the chancellor of North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, has spent the summer months immersed in planning to make returning to campus as safe as possible for the schools student body, faculty and staff. With more than 12,500 students, NC A&T is the nations largest historically black university and under Martin, it has become one of the top producers of African American STEM graduates in the country.

Demand for the schools STEM graduates has increased so much in recent years that the school has added multiple job fairs to handle the influx of recruiters from big tech companies.

Classes started Aug. 19 with a hybrid model. About 70% percent of students returned to the Greensboro campus for a combination of virtual and in-person instruction, in classrooms outfitted with plexiglass protections for professors and socially distanced seating. Football and other fall sports have been canceled. Martin, 68, joined TIME for a video conversation about the schools safety protocols, what its like to lead an institution with a rich history in the civil rights movement during a period of national protests against systemic racism (the Greensboro Four, who began the historic 1960 sit-in at the Woolworths lunch counter in Greensboro, were all freshmen at NC A&T and are known locally as the A&T Four), and the selection of Sen. Kamala Harris as the Democratic vice presidential candidate.

Subscribe to The Leadership Brief by clicking here.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Senator Harris embodies so much that is important and worthy about historically black universities, and it is truly a historic moment to see one of our graduates included on the Democratic ticket. We join our friends at Howard in their celebration of this extraordinary development. Having experienced the history-making presidential campaigns of our own alumnus, the Rev. Jesse Jackson, in 1984 and 1988, we know well the national significance of such an electoral event and how it can help many Americans to see HBCUs in a new and perhaps different light.

Its the same argument I gave myself when we spoke to both our boys who are both overachievers academically: that we want you to go to a university where you will have access to the very best faculty and the best friends and the best experiences to grow personally and professionally. And never have compromised in any way, shape or fashion your preparation for your career or for your profession or for access to Americas top graduate and professional schools. We can demonstrate that time and time again, there are very few universities in America that do what we do as well as we do it for African American students.

HBCUs have fared well in federal funding over the past three years. Title III support has increased. $85 million in annual STEM funding for HBCUs was made permanent and year-round funding for Pell Grants was approved. Passage of all of those reflect positively on the president and his administration.

Well, Im insulted quite honestly. Im sort of appalled by the notion that one would make such a claim.

No.

I think he tends to inflame situations and tends to divide versus providing a voice that is healing for our nation on the heels of COVID-19 where theres been evidence of so many missteps by the Administration.

Probably as optimistic as Ive been. I do feel its in a different moment. The corporate boards I serve on, we have a very different conversation with our board members about what this means and how we must rethink the way we do business. I spend enormous amounts of my time engaging with our students, and I believe because of the great history and traditions of our university as an institution actively involved in social change over the decades, and because of my own experiences growing up in America, as an African American individual, overlapping into periods of segregation and Jim Crow, my experiences tell me this feels different. This is more than just about police brutality. This is also very significantly about disparities in America that are embedded in racism through education, health care, unemployment, wealth, et cetera. And no matter how you cut it, were not going to get out of some of these deep-seated race-based disparities until America comes to grip with our racism.

If I look at most people in America, those who have not come from wealth, education has played the biggest part in transforming those individuals lives, including my own. And as a consequence I would say that education is one of the most critical investments we can make in changing the outcomes and trajectory for young people in America.

If I look at most people in America, those who have not come from wealth, education has played the biggest part in transforming those individuals' lives, including my own.

It is a great point of pride for us. The number of corporations and agencies that have come to our university to recruit our graduates over the last five to seven years has grown in record numbers. We have built very strong relationships with Apple, Intel, Google, Facebook, Twitter, for example. Amazon. Silicon Valley recruits our graduates in record numbers, along with a host of organizations and state agencies and federal agencies from around the world.

Its a mixed bag. I believe certainly in the most recent few months following the unfortunate murder of George Floyd for all the world to see, theres a higher level of consciousness around having more meaningful conversations.

I shared this with my corporate colleagues and CEOs of these organizations. Look, you cant continue to come to the table and drop a dime here and a dollar there. Or multiple dollars there. Youre trying to get access to our very best resource, and we have to make big investments to make that happen.

We have seen significant increases in internship opportunities for our students. And weve seen significant increases in corporate contributions and foundation contributions.

Over the years, the military has been one of the leading organizations in America that has valued diversity. It has not all been perfect by any measure, but its been one of the leading organizations that has provided advancement opportunities for people of color. Our ROTC program has become an incredible source of pride for our university. It serves as the hub for all ROTC programs in the region. We attract exceptionally talented students who are engineers and health care providers who are graduating and theyre being commissioned at commencement. And theyre going off to serve America.

My PhD dissertation was a highly theoretical model representing computer systems that were framed as a mathematical model, and if they were interconnected in such a way that these interconnected computers would communicate like cells in the body. Whether I wanted to remain engaged in research and teaching graduates being engaged in scholarship, or be pulled away into administration, that was really a tug-of-war for me.

Guarded but comfortable.

All of our students who are returning to the campus have been checked for symptoms as they move into the residence hall .

We obviously are requiring masking. Safe social distancing. We have a high intensity cleansing protocol on a daily basis and a daily morning ritual of self-assessment, of all students who are living in residence halls. And each of our classrooms was reduced to about 30% occupancy.

They can apply to telework. Weve been very generous in providing those employees the opportunity to tele-work.

About 60% of our faculty will be tele-working this fall.

About 60% of our faculty will be tele-working this fall.

Weve ordered a million masks. And then weve ordered somewhere around 30 to 40,000 branded cloth masks. All students, faculty and staff will get at least two of those.

Our students are responding overall. They are 18, 19, 20 year olds, though, and so we have to continue to remind them of the expectations, quite honestly.

It is an inspiration to me. In every conversation , itll come up. We cant compromise what we do.

Subscribe to The Leadership Brief by clicking here.

BUSINESS BOOK: Good to Great by Jim Collins

AUTHOR: Isaac Asimov

APP: Twitter

EXERCISE/STRESS RELIEVER: Walking and working out in home gym. And golf, schedule permitting.

Subscribe to The Leadership Brief by clicking here.

For your security, we've sent a confirmation email to the address you entered. Click the link to confirm your subscription and begin receiving our newsletters. If you don't get the confirmation within 10 minutes, please check your spam folder.

Contact us at editors@time.com.

Go here to see the original:
Chancellor Harold L. Martin, on His Plan to Safely Open the Nation's Largest HCBU During COVID-19 - TIME