COVID-19 and Higher Ed: Weekly Update
 April 20-24, 2020
The latest developments regarding the impact of COVID-19 on New England's colleges and universities, students, and families.
Updates from New England Institutions
Check out NEBHE's COVID-19 updated dashboard for complete data
  • 203: HEIs that have switched the spring semester to a digital modality (no change from last week)

  • 97: HEIs that have implemented flexible grading policies for the spring semester (+10 over last week)

  • 101: HEIs that are offering room and board refund or credit (no change from last week)

  • 57: HEIs that have shifted summer courses to a digital modality (+6 over last week)
Resource Spotlight
Career Services and Professional Skill Development in COVID-19
For HEIs and Employer Partners:
Virtual Internship Program. In response to COVID-19, a Northeastern University (NEU) research team is opening up access to their NSF-funded Virtual Internship program to support summer internships and campus employment programs with the goal of helping preserve career advancement and economic support opportunities for high-need undergraduate students. The program is highly scaffolded with contextualized digital literacy, project management, communication, and teamwork skill building content that supports a broad range of virtual experiential projects on and off campus, with or without academic credit.
 
The NEU research team will train your faculty and/or program managers to use virtual internship model and digital platform to provide administrative oversight and quality assurance for remote participants. Each participating HEI remains responsible for coordinating internship opportunities for their students.

What Employers Need to Know When Offering Virtual Internships. A helpful set of guidelines for designing virtual internship programs created by the University of Rhode Island.

For Students and Workers:

Tips for Thinking About Career Paths Post-Coronavirus
  • Embrace the remote aspect of work and training. The effects of the recent shift to remote professional activity – e.g., working from home, online teaching, virtual conferences, remote training, etc. – will likely be long-lasting. Use this time to adapt and innovate. For agile employers and postsecondary institution leaders, the ability to quickly adapt to these changes could open new recruiting opportunities.
  • Focus on what is within your control. There's a Chinese proverb that says, “May you live in interesting times.” It's safe to say we do. While our current situation is unprecedented and the global pandemic has been out of essentially everyone's control, COVID-19 will likely not be the only external factor individuals will have to deal with in their lifetimes. There will always be situations that are outside our power to control, such as major company changes, demographics shifts, etc. Workers can make the most of this time by focusing on what is within their sphere of control: take advantage of available career advancement opportunities to develop the differentiator skills that make it easier to adapt to an ever-changing world.
  • Think ahead: create a professional development self-evaluation plan. Establish career goals and plot a path toward achieving them. Use a self-evaluation worksheet, such as this one produced by Indiana University.
Promising Practices
Response to COVID-19-Related College Closures:
The Maine Welcome: America’s First In-State Tuition College Dream Completion Program. The University of Maine System (UMS) is launching an in-state tuition college dream completion program providing resident tuition status to any successful U.S. college student or law student displaced by a COVID-19-related permanent closure of a U.S. institution of higher education. The UMS also will extend The Maine Welcome as a component of teach-out agreements with institutions permanently ceasing operations and seeking reasonable opportunities for students to complete their programs of study. 

Career Training Support:
University of Southern Maine's FREE Friday Career Talks. Career advisors from USM host live talks on career topics each Friday morning from 10:00 am-10:45 am. Upcoming topics include advice on virtual interviewing and job search strategies during COVID-19. The page also highlights employment opportunities in Maine resulting from the pandemic, as well as resources for student professional development.

Onward to Opportunity , offered through Syracuse University’s Institute for Veterans and Military Families, is a free career training and professional certification program that allows transitioning service members, veterans, and military spouses to maintain progress toward post-service, in-demand careers during the COVID-19 shutdown.

Is your institution offering free or innovative career training opportunities during the COVID-19 pandemic? Let us know by emailing  policy@nebhe.org .
Distance Learning, Compliance, and New England SARA
Schools and colleges collect enormous amounts of data to support their operations and assessment through learning management systems, student information databases, library systems, and services extending as far as online education and student support tools, sometimes provided by third-party vendors. 

No matter the data collection medium, K-12 schools, postsecondary institutions, and state agencies who participate in federally funded programs must comply with the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) . The law requires the above entities to follow certain requirements when collecting and sharing “Personally Identifiable Information” or “PII.”
Compliance Consideration of the Week:
FERPA in Light of COVID-19

  • A USED FAQ directs school officials to “work with their state and local public health officials to determine the information needed to address this public health concern. Understanding how, what, and when information can be shared is a critical part of preparedness.”

  • Additional information in the FAQ clarifies the health and safety exception to FERPA’s general rule requiring consent prior to disclosing PII to third parties. For more, we recommend this summary by Cooley LLP.

  • Practitioners, administrators, and education leaders should also consider their obligations to protect PII as they engage with new vendors in the proliferation of online learning. The school, college or agency must still own and direct the use the data. See USED's PTAC division "Model Terms of Service"

Additional Resources:
SREB Top Ten in EdTech:
Intersection of data privacy & security, best practices in data governance and security risk mitigation
Free Online Training Module:
U.S. Department of Education FERPA 101, including exceptions to requirement for consent. Note: Registration required
Questions?
rstachowiak@nebhe.org
617-533-9503
For more, visit NEBHE's COVID-19 Resource Page
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