By EMMA RUBIN ’20
“When the College moved to making COVID-19 decisions, we didn’t stick with our normal process of decision making,” Senior Associate Director of the Student Employment Office Jenny Watermill said. “It was really emergency decision making.”
Since Mount Holyoke officially closed its campus for the academic year, roughly 800 student employment positions have been lost. Of the over 400 student jobs that remain, most positions — including those in Admissions, Student Financial Services, Library Information and Technology Services (LITS) or academic departments — have begun operating remotely and with a limit of 4.5 hours per week.
The Senior Policy Group, made up of college offices and administration, oversaw the rebudgeting of different departments amidst the emergency scenario. Typically, departments receive an annual budget in July, but under the circumstances the budgets were essentially centralized.
“No one really considered their budget ‘theirs’ anymore,” Watermill said.
This means that many individual Mount Holyoke budgets were consolidated into a pool and are now being redistributed. These recently-centralized funds are also being considered to help alleviate other emergency expenses and lost revenue, according to Watermill.
Watermill, who led the Student Employment Emergency Response Team, said the Senior Policy Group told each Emergency Response Team to keep costs down as much as possible. First, the group had to decide which student jobs would be available following the campus closure. Through a form, supervisors requested student employees and justified why their work was essential. The senior policy group then approved certain remote and on-campus positions.
The declining number of available student jobs goes beyond finances. It also deals with laws regarding remote work across state lines. According to Watermill, the College felt in these extraordinary circumstances that they were comfortable offering some remote work and could argue that position legally. To decision makers, that also meant remote work had to be limited so that their decision on the essentiality of the work wouldn’t be diminished.
Student employees who continue to work have been limited to 4.5 hours per week. Watermill said that considering the budget constraints, this was so more students could continue to work rather than fewer students with more hours.
Mount Holyoke announced it would provide work-study students a transitional allowance of $420, before tax. According to Watermill, the $420 was calculated based on the average weekly hours for work-study students, 6.45 hours, and the most common wage, $13 per hour. She also said that the money was not meant to be a substitute for lost wages, but rather a financial transition as students move into new situations or return home.
Following their own campus closure, neighboring Smith College is paying work-study students an estimation of what they would have made based on the weekly average number of hours worked up to their total work-study package. Watermill said that this was not an option for Mount Holyoke, because many high-need students had already passed the allotment in their work-study package.
Chisato Kimura ’22 has been disappointed with Student Employment’s handling of the situation. “I think it was laziness on the part of Student Employment that they just gave everyone the same amount,” she said. “Clearly not everyone has the same needs, hours worked or things like that.”
For many students who rely on campus employment for a source of income, the federal government’s response has also provided little relief. Congress passed a stimulus package in March which promised to provide $1,200 to eligible Americans. However, adult-age dependents were not included in the bill. For Mount Holyoke student workers, this means that, if a parent or guardian lists them as a dependent on their tax return, neither they nor their household will receive a check for them, even if they pay individual income taxes.
“We know folks are dealing with all kinds of extraordinary situations and we are really sensitive and worried about that,” Watermill said. “That was part of every conversation every time.
On Tuesday, April 7, student employees continuing to work on campus in roles with regular proximity with other people were granted “premium” or hazard pay. This followed a decision in mid-March which provided full-time essential workers on Mount Holyoke’s campus with hazard pay. The change will affect five student positions including roles in Dining and Auxiliary Services, and less than 50 students.
Chisato Kimura ’22 has been working in Dining Services since Mount Holyoke transitioned to remote learning. “The hazard pay is recognizing they are essential employees, recognizing they’re putting their lives in danger by working,” she said. “[And] recognizing that the workers are essential for keeping the communities going.”
Kimura, who is the only student currently working for Dining Services, was happy when she first heard her coworkers had received hazard pay. But as she saw students working on-campus in other departments, she found it strange that student employees hadn’t been granted the same pay. Kimura decided to contact Jenny Watermill.
Watermill said that, when Mount Holyoke essential staff received hazard pay, the Student Employment Emergency Response Team began considering it for student employees. She explained that they had to go through multiple levels up to the Senior Policy Group who oversaw the school’s entire emergency budget. “That’s where the delay came from,” she said. “There were several decision-making steps to walk through.”
Kimura was frustrated by the slow response. “We were deemed essential workers but it was taking such a long time to make sure that hazard pay was given to us,” she said.
Amidst the changing situation regarding on-campus student employment, over 200 students who work in Dining Services were overpaid on March 27. Due to a payroll processing error, each of their hours were logged twice. The error was discovered after checks and direct deposits had already been sent out.
Human Resources plans to forgive $40 of the overpayment, and for work-study students, the amount of the error will be automatically deducted from the $420 transitional allowance.
In an email to affected work-study students, Compensation and Payroll Manager Kim Ouimet wrote, “In order to correct this error, I will need to reduce your upcoming transition allowance. I am truly sorry for this error especially during this challenging time.”
“The payroll staff will work with the 40 students who remain with an overage to design repayment plans that are comfortable for individual students and are administered overtime if needed,” Associate Vice President of Human Resources Heidi Friedman said.