In year of COVID-19 challenges, SU employees have worked nonstop

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Mark Tewksbury recalls seeing just four cars on his way to work at Syracuse University last March.

Tewksbury, who is the director of residence hall dining and Dome operations for Food Services, has been working to deliver meals to students in quarantine and those who had to stay on campus during breaks since the coronavirus pandemic hit. He was among the group of SU employees who continued working even after SU’s campus shut down last spring.

“When the pandemic began back in March, most people were afraid to leave their house,” Tewksbury said. “But our staff just stepped up. There were 600 students on campus who couldn’t get home, and nobody questioned.”

The university began monitoring the pandemic more than a year ago, watching the effects of the pandemic on other colleges and universities, said Joe Hernon, the director of emergency management at SU.

“We were really looking very closely at what was happening at (other universities), seeing what they were doing and basically thinking, ‘Wow, that’s crazy. Could we ever imagine a time like that?’” Hernon said. “Then a few months later, well, here we are.”

Since then, employees have been working to keep the university afloat. They’ve made phone calls to parents, created new safety protocols and set up makeshift offices. Though challenging, workers said the experience has also been rewarding at times.

As the one year anniversary of SU’s campus shutdown approaches, here are some of their stories:

Community in isolation

Every night, Angela Noon sees a group of students enter Graham Dining Hall hoping for some grilled cheese. And every night, Noon, who is the manager at Graham, makes it for them.

“If that’s what they want, I’m more than happy to give it to them,” Noon said.

Noon, who has worked at Graham since August 2019, said interactions like this make her feel closer to the students and staff she works with.

“COVID is pretty scary, not just for adults, but for young adults as well,” Noon said. “There’s a lot of uncertainties. I think it makes our student population feel much more comfortable knowing that they can come to myself or to one of our other staff members and just have conversations.”

Even though students and employees are masked and socially distanced, they have the chance to interact in person after spending much of their days online.

Last week, a student employee showed Noon how to make shawarma, which is a new addition to the Graham menu. Another employee from Cuba helped host a Cuban food night.

“The culinary aspect of food really brings people together,” Noon said. “I absolutely believe in the power of that.”

Angela Noon has worked at SU’s Graham Dining Hall since August 2019. Courtesy of Keone Weigl

But most of all, Noon said the pandemic has caused people to be more empathetic for one another. There is a mutual understanding between students and employees in the dining hall about how to keep everyone safe, she said.

“People are more inclined to talk with one another and put on a different pair of shoes,” Noon said. “People are a lot more empathetic than they were prior to COVID because everyone really is in it together.”

A silver lining

SU’s Department of Emergency Management focuses on preparing students and staff for emergency situations. Traditionally, these emergencies include severe weather alerts and power outages. But a year ago, the department added pandemics to that list.

COVID-19 significantly increased demand on the department, which was directly involved in developing many of SU’s safety protocols, Hernon said.

SU created a public health team to manage the effects of the pandemic, which includes volunteers from the Barnes Center at The Arch and faculty from Falk College. Other groups look at how specific data and government policies affect SU, Hernon said.

“We’re on the front lines of our university’s battle with COVID,” Hernon said.

More stories on SU employees and COVID-19:

• ’Deep inequity’: Some at-risk SU employees ineligible for COVID-19 vaccine
• Faculty raise concerns about SU’s COVID-19 response, workload at forum
• How professors are redesigning their courses amid COVID-19
• SU will provide COVID-19 testing for family of faculty, staff

The department relies on several other people to ensure that everyone is prepared for disasters when they do occur. Hernon said. This allows Hernon to work alongside people he may have otherwise never interacted with.

“If everyone is bought in to being prepared and ready to face the next adversity, as it be a natural disaster, power outages, floods or a global pandemic, it helps and you can rely on your neighbor,” he said.

Since the pandemic is an ongoing disaster, employees are still learning about how to better handle emergencies going forward, Hernon said. SU holds weekly meetings to discuss ongoing problems and potential solutions.

“Some of the ways that it changes is it presents new challenges that we often don’t think about or we took for granted,” Hernon said. “I think that’s one of the biggest things that I always find the silver lining of a disaster is we can find ways to learn from our mistakes and improve.”

Providing comfort

Ruth Sullivan, who is the assistant director of nutrition management for Food Services, said the pandemic has made this one of her busiest years.

Sullivan works with students who have dietary needs, including those with allergies or chronic illnesses such as Crohn’s disease or celiac disease. With the hopes of strengthening their immune systems in the face of the pandemic, some students have become more concerned about what they’re eating, she said.

More students are reaching out to Sullivan now, especially if they are in quarantine, she said.

“Students will come to campus with a special diet and try to go it alone,” Sullivan said. “But if a student is in isolation and now they have to do takeout, they are a little bit more concerned about their safety, so they would contact me.”

Sullivan has also been working with parents who have expressed concerns that their children wouldn’t have access to the food they need. Sullivan said she now makes herself available day and night as well as on the weekends to assure parents that their children are taken care of.

“If a student needs something, we give it to them,” Sullivan said. “We know exactly what they can and can’t eat, and they know what they can have. By looking at information, making sure that it’s updated and providing ingredients, we’re telling the parents not to worry. They’re going to get what they need.”

Adapting and adjusting

Last March, Tewksbury and Sullivan, along with several other staff members, set up desks in Sadler Dining Hall to answer phones and ensure that students who were staying on campus had everything they needed.

Tewksbury and other members of the concessions staff would then deliver food and other items to students.

“We had students who wanted a yoga mat, so we found a way to get a yoga mat. We had five students who wanted a fan, scissors, a desk lamp, because they were still doing work,” Tewksbury said. “We can make sure that if they want anything or need anything, we can take care of them.”

Now, whenever a student enters isolation for COVID-19, they receive a text message from Tewksbury or someone else on his team to let them know how to access food and other necessities, Tewksbury said.

“That helps parents and students so they don’t feel disconnected,” Tewksbury said.

Tewksbury is proud of how his staff has adjusted to the pandemic. Many employees had to come to campus in March and April, when people were still unsure of how to stay safe amid the pandemic, he said.

“Our staff has been amazing — adapting to the new stuff every day, just coming to work,” Tewksbury said. “They all stepped up and did what we needed to do to make sure that the students who were on campus at any point in time were taken care of.”