Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason
Speaker 1: Kelly on Bloomberg Radio. So that is a perfect segue
Speaker 1: to our next guest. Joann Burger Sweeney is the president
Speaker 1: of Trinity College, joining us on the phone from Hartford,
Speaker 1: and I had the pleasure of meeting her several years
Speaker 1: ago through one of their key alum from the private
Speaker 1: equity world, Paul Raither. He and I went up to
Speaker 1: do a little session. Joanne is amazing, so happy to
Speaker 1: have you here with us. How are you doing? I
Speaker 1: am doing well. Thank you for asking. I'm doing well
Speaker 1: because I do think this is a time of hope
Speaker 1: and a time of potential change. It is we hope
Speaker 1: and and tell us why tell us why you're you're hopeful?
Speaker 1: Because I have to say, Joanne, you are in the
Speaker 1: midst of so many things in the world of higher education.
Speaker 1: Just to start, when you're thinking about coming back to school,
Speaker 1: let's start there. What is that like right now for
Speaker 1: students at Trinity Right So, we are planning for a
Speaker 1: robust experience for our students, taking into consideration health and
Speaker 1: safety as a priority. Our students will be meeting regularly
Speaker 1: and have safe interactions with their professors. We think with
Speaker 1: coaches and staff, we are also ready to pivot if
Speaker 1: we need to again to have remote learning. So we
Speaker 1: are preparing to engage our students in new and interesting ways,
Speaker 1: even if that needs to be remote. UM. We're planning
Speaker 1: to support them because they need help in figuring out
Speaker 1: how to navigate this new normal. And then, you know,
Speaker 1: on a practical basis, of course, we are planning to
Speaker 1: have face covering, physical distance, reminders of hand washing, self
Speaker 1: monitoring of symptoms, and mandatory public health education for when
Speaker 1: they come back to campus. But you're going to be
Speaker 1: on campus. It is certainly our plan to be on campus. UM.
Speaker 1: We were very fortunate to determine that we had seventeen
Speaker 1: hundred individual beds behind doors. Now sometimes it's off of
Speaker 1: a suite, but we had seventeen hundred UM individual bed
Speaker 1: spaces here at Trinity, and generally we have two thousand students,
Speaker 1: so that allow will allow our students to come back
Speaker 1: and UM also have UM private or individual rooms. And
Speaker 1: we thought, with those circumstances, and with the guidance that
Speaker 1: we've been provided by the State of Connecticut, that we
Speaker 1: are planning for a reopening. You know, recognizing of course
Speaker 1: that if conditions are such that we cannot open UM,
Speaker 1: you know, will have to then pivot to remote learning.
Speaker 1: And so, what are you hearing from students, especially incoming
Speaker 1: students sort of news? The first year students, I would imagine,
Speaker 1: I have to think they're the most both apprehensive but
Speaker 1: also maybe the most eager at the same time, Joanta,
Speaker 1: what are the conversations like there with them and their parents? Right,
Speaker 1: It's it's amazing how eager they are to come to college. Um.
Speaker 1: We had one of our largest classes, more than six
Speaker 1: hundred students who accepted Trinity College, which we thought was
Speaker 1: surprising given the pandemic. But I think that people really
Speaker 1: want to come back. We did a survey of students
Speaker 1: and even before we had given them you know what
Speaker 1: health and safety measures were going to look like, it's
Speaker 1: just what's your likelihood of coming back? And eighty five
Speaker 1: of our students and parents said they were either very
Speaker 1: likely or likely to come back. And then there was another, um,
Speaker 1: you know, almost ten percent that said, well, we're waiting
Speaker 1: to see you know what health and safety measures you have,
Speaker 1: so people want to come back. UM, And I'll share
Speaker 1: with you that I'm the parent of a college age student.
Speaker 1: He wants to go back, and I want him to
Speaker 1: go back already. So are our students to go back,
Speaker 1: aren't we? So as you know, Jason has two teenagers
Speaker 1: UM and also a little one, but two teenagers. He
Speaker 1: and I both have UM kids who are going to
Speaker 1: be seniors in high school. And I gotta tell you,
Speaker 1: I cannot. I love my daughter, I cannot wait for
Speaker 1: her to kind of be back within school and she
Speaker 1: misses it a lot. So we totally get it, absolutely.
Speaker 1: You know. When I talked to parents, they all get it,
Speaker 1: and they laugh when I say, oh no, no, no,
Speaker 1: everybody one, yeah, no, no, you're right there, wagon for sure.
Speaker 1: All right. One interesting sort of pivot point is the
Speaker 1: s A T and standardized test because in the midst
Speaker 1: of this pandemic that's obviously been turned upside down Carol,
Speaker 1: as she alluded to, and I are very aware of
Speaker 1: this UM having rising seniors, But there are bigger questions
Speaker 1: about standardized tests and the s A T as it
Speaker 1: relates to access and diversity of candidates and fairness. Tell
Speaker 1: us how you've come down on that, right, So UM
Speaker 1: Trinity College is test optional, which means that you don't
Speaker 1: have to turn in either an S A T or
Speaker 1: an A C T. And now the majority of our
Speaker 1: students do not turn in standard dive test um. One
Speaker 1: of the reasons we decided to eliminate the necessity for
Speaker 1: standardized test is because of the very, very high correlation
Speaker 1: between your test scores and your income level. So it's
Speaker 1: I mean, think about it. If you can take the
Speaker 1: S A T three or four times and your family
Speaker 1: can afford a tutor um, do you think that you
Speaker 1: have a greater likelihood of having a higher S A
Speaker 1: T or someone who has to come in take it
Speaker 1: cold gets to take it once, you know, at their
Speaker 1: high school for free, and that's it. So how long
Speaker 1: before most colleges and universities get rid of it? Because
Speaker 1: when you say that, like, then why would you why
Speaker 1: would any university or college want to keep it? Right?
Speaker 1: You know, it's interesting because people originally thought it was
Speaker 1: an equalize when there was such a variation across in institutions,
Speaker 1: you know, about what courses you could take or what
Speaker 1: does the NAIM mean at this school versus that school.
Speaker 1: But so we instituted the standardized tests and now we're
Speaker 1: finding that they are as problematic. But what I want
Speaker 1: people to understand is there are ways that you can
Speaker 1: determine um a person's likelihood of succeeding in college, and
Speaker 1: the best is great and their teacher recommendations interesting. So
Speaker 1: it just requires a little bit. It sounds like it
Speaker 1: requires just a little bit more creative thinking. So Joanne,
Speaker 1: I have to ask you. You know, I mentioned at
Speaker 1: the end of the last segment, you're the first black
Speaker 1: and first female president of Trinity College. I'm sure you're
Speaker 1: getting questions like this all the time. What do we
Speaker 1: do to make this more than a moment? M hm um.
Speaker 1: I think already it is more than a moment, And
Speaker 1: somehow people are listening to each other in a different
Speaker 1: manner than happened six months ago. Now, I believe that
Speaker 1: here at a place like Trinity College, where we offer
Speaker 1: a liberal arts education, it demands that people have a
Speaker 1: sense of humanity, a true understanding and compassion comes from
Speaker 1: listening to one another with an open heart and empathetically
Speaker 1: imagining what it's like to experience the world through someone
Speaker 1: else's perspective. And I think that then demands that you
Speaker 1: act empathetically. So I think what is happening right now
Speaker 1: is people are listening differently than they did six months ago.
Speaker 1: I suspect it's something to do with the interaction between
Speaker 1: COVID people being stuck at home, um, maybe not being
Speaker 1: able to go out and interact in the same way.
Speaker 1: And that meant that every single person saw that George
Speaker 1: Floyd video, and think about it, that may not have
Speaker 1: happened if everybody hadn't been sitting at home right and
Speaker 1: we would have all been so quick to rush off
Speaker 1: to the next thing, which is which which is if
Speaker 1: you think about it, like if you get kind of whoa,
Speaker 1: you know, where we are in this world, like on
Speaker 1: a grand scale like this amazing you know that these
Speaker 1: two things crossed one another at the same time. Um,
Speaker 1: so how do we how do we be better off
Speaker 1: of this? Then? Okay, so we have you know, we
Speaker 1: we've been able to experience this unfortunately altogether. But if
Speaker 1: it does get us to a better place, But how
Speaker 1: do we make sure we get to a better place
Speaker 1: and that we're not having this discussion in another year
Speaker 1: or two years or five years. Yeah, that's a great question,
Speaker 1: and thank you for asking. I think we have to
Speaker 1: agree to act, And so yesterday I sent out a
Speaker 1: letter to the entire Trinity College community, everyone on campus,
Speaker 1: but also our entire alumni network, and I made some
Speaker 1: commitments and some action steps that I was going to follow.
Speaker 1: Um I talked about requiring all campus members, trustees, all
Speaker 1: key volunteers to complete anti racist, unconscious bias equity education.
Speaker 1: In the fall. I asked our Education Policy Committee to
Speaker 1: create special opportunity hires because we need to increase our
Speaker 1: faculty diversity. Our students of color need to see themselves
Speaker 1: here in the academy. Um I decided to fund particular
Speaker 1: activities that students were requesting us to do, and more
Speaker 1: than anything, our board of trustees, over a two day retreat,
Speaker 1: spent approximately four hours discussing these issues, listening reading the
Speaker 1: comments that the students of color had unfortunately going to
Speaker 1: be different. Yeah it is. We could talk to you
Speaker 1: for the rest of the night. Uh. We hope you'll
Speaker 1: come back, especially as the school year hopefully gets underway.
Speaker 1: Joann Berger Sweeney, President of Trinity College, joining us on
Speaker 1: the phone from Hartford. Such a thoughtful conversation