My College’s Reopening Will Endanger Our Diverse Local Community
Christopher Newport University was built on unfair treatment of local minorities. If they reopen this fall as planned, leadership may accidentally do it again.
Christopher Newport University (CNU) was founded in 1960 as “Christopher Newport College,” a branch of William & Mary, and began educating in an old elementary school building. Newport News’ city council spent the next three years fighting their Black community for the land of Shoe Lane, where CNU eventually was built. The council voted 5–2, against the wishes of the majority of Black residents, to buy homeowners out of Shoe Lane instead of moving the school one mile down the road where Todd Stadium now sits.
In recent years, the dark beginnings of CNU’s land ownership came to light publicly. Through research and writings, CNU’s current leadership were educated about a former member of their board of visitors, William Walker Jr., a Black Newport News citizen who’d fought the city’s plans to acquire Shoe Lane. Walker ultimately failed in his goal, but in 2019 current leadership revealed a plaque in his honor and named a stretch of lawn after him.
Flash forward to present day: The nation is in the midst of a seemingly endless coronavirus pandemic, where the United States has more cases and deaths than any other country. Over the last month, Virginia has seen a surge in coronavirus cases, with a frightening majority of them in the Hampton Roads. Virginia hit peak numbers of daily cases in July that it hadn’t seen in over a month. On July 27th they hit 1,505 cases, the highest numbers in two months, proving the local surge is not slowing down.
In a Daily Press article from July 28th on the virus in the Hampton Roads, Dave Ress wrote, “The percentage of people testing positive has skyrocketed in the past two or three weeks from about 4% to between 10% and 12%.” Governor Northam announced new executive orders specifically for the Hampton Roads, with one being that no social gathering of more than 50 people is allowed.
In a New York Times article from July 31st titled “The Risk That Students Could Arrive at School With the Coronavirus,” the paper estimates that 4 in every 500 people in Newport News could bring the virus onto campuses if school started right now. CNU could possibly have more than 5,000 people on campus in less than two weeks.
Meanwhile, public schools in the area will likely start virtually for the fall, as Norfolk became the first to confirm their plans on July 22nd. Not long after, the majority of the school systems in the 757 all vocalized plans for likely virtual instruction in the first nine weeks.
Hampton University, an HBCU that sits only 12 miles southeast of CNU, announced on July 2nd that they would roll back their reopening plans and elect to instruct virtually this fall. Hampton’s President, Dr. William R. Harvey, noted the reasons for the reversal being the surge of cases in the nation, in Virginia, and states where students would be coming back from. Yet, only days later, CNU’s President Paul Trible sent an email to students stating plans to reopen campus.
Reopening the CNU campus to thousands of students, staff and faculty could create another surge of dangerous coronavirus cases in the Hampton Roads while the area already struggles to contain the virus. Case numbers and hospitalizations are up. The vast majority of people with the virus are in the age group of students who will be coming back to CNU’s 260 acre campus. CNU’s campus also is smaller than HU’s by 54 acres and has more students, yet President Trible has been adamant about reopening. CNU’s leadership moving along with disregard for the safety of the Hampton Roads is tough to swallow, but is nothing new.
According to the CDC, someone in the Black or Brown community is four times more likely to contract the coronavirus than a White person. The percentage of Black or Brown people in Newport News is 45%, compared to 44% White. Hampton’s residents (the city connected to Newport News on the Peninsula) are 54% Black or Brown and 43% White.
And according to the Virginia Department of Health, when looking at cases in the Black and Brown community vs the White, 62% of the cases in Newport News are from the Black or Brown community, 80% in Hampton, and 82% in both Norfolk and Portsmouth.
By choosing to reopen the CNU campus, after HU chose the safest route for their school, CNU’s leadership looks inept and unconcerned for the community’s Black and Brown citizens.
In an email sent out to students, staff and faculty on July 20th, President Trible laid out vague plans to reopen the campus in the next couple weeks. Trible touted that, “we have measured classrooms and moved furniture, stocked up on sanitizing supplies and equipment and developed new ideas for physical distancing.” He finished by saying, “I know I can count on each of you to care about our community and accept these and other responsibilities that come with our fall semester.” Moving furniture and measuring the classrooms simply are not safer choices than deciding to not reopen campus in the fall, like Hampton University.
Unfortunately, this wasn’t the first tone-deaf message sent this summer by email from President Trible.
In the wake of the George Floyd murder and subsequent protests, civil rights movements blossomed all over the world. New York Times Columnist Jamelle Bouie, writing from Charlottesville, where the infamous “Unite the Right” rally was held, viewed the protests as “scenes of a society at a breaking point.” But Trible also saw what he chose to see: his son’s Richmond luxury clothing store getting ransacked. He then used a Martin Luther King Jr. quote to call for “positive and lasting ways” to change our society, echoing something White people have been doing for decades: hiding behind a “peaceful” MLK quote to ignore the ugly truths in America.
The email inspired thousands of students and alumni to sign a letter from 2017 grad Marlon Dubuisson criticizing the CNU President for his message about the protests. He eventually apologized to Mr. Dubuisson in a letter and emailed that out as a public response to his initial tone-deaf email.
In the letter Trible says, “This is also a time for us to have a serious conversation and really listen to each other. It is difficult for me and many others to fully feel the depth of your pain and anger because we have not walked in your shoes. Our campus community needs to more fully understand what it’s like being Black in America.”
Currently, being Black in America means you are four times more likely to contract the coronavirus than White people. We, as a community, must look out for and protect the Black and Brown people who share lives with us in the Tidewater region.
Unfortunately for Trible, he can’t rescind an email. But, he can rescind the current plans for reopening, and follow the lead of Hampton University’s President Harvey by only allowing virtual learning for the fall semester. If Trible truly believes in what he said in his apology email, “Black lives matter to me and always have and always will,” then he should be concerned for the citizens of the Hampton Roads and reopening his campus.
If CNU continues with their current reopening plan they’ll possibly endanger the Black and Brown communities of the Hampton Roads. Sadly, as seen with the Shoe Lane controversy of the early 1960’s, this kind of ineptitude is prevalent in the school’s history.
I’ll conclude this story with this message to CNU: Leading a life of significance means making a difference in the lives of others. It means striving for excellence and honor, respecting and valuing one another. Significance is leadership and good citizenship, a devotion to beliefs and causes much larger than we are.
Those are the words directly from CNU’s mantra of “significance”, how they define it, and why they teach their students it. Please respect and value the home of your university by keeping its citizens safe, as well as students, faculty and staff, instead of endangering them.
CNU did not respond to my request for comment on this story, but later sent out an email to announce the delay of the beginning of classes by two weeks because of COVID-19. They also announced the option for students to cancel their housing contracts and take classes at home if they wish, but still plan on reopening campus and moving students into buildings as soon as possible.
