APRIL 6, 2020 Update: COVID-19

Message to Student Employees & Supervisors from Interim President, Dr. Laurie Quinn

Dear Student Employees and Supervisors,

I am writing with an important update on student employment as we continue navigating the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on the Champlain community, including the remote semester decision announced in my video message at the end of last week. I am grateful to our students who have continued to work remotely with support from our faculty and staff supervisors who are providing mentorship from afar. We also recognize that there are many roles that are not possible to do remotely, whether they involve data or systems that cannot be accessed remotely or are tied to our physical campus or providing hospitality to prospective students and other visitors.

We know your ability to earn student job income is important to making a college education possible. Therefore, we are making a commitment to paying all student employees, both those working remotely and those who cannot, from the beginning of the period of remote instruction through the end of the semester based on their scheduled hours established prior to spring break. Continued pay will apply to  students whose job is under a Federal Work Study award as part of their financial aid package and also those student workers who are paid directly by the College in non-work study employment. 

Determining the timing and total amount of these payments will require additional work by our Finance, Financial Aid, and Human Resources teams in cooperation with each student employee’s supervisor. I did not want to delay in sharing this decision to provide some small assurance during this uncertain time, but I ask for your patience as we work out the details of fulfilling this commitment. There are a number of important factors to evaluate, including compliance with Department of Education guidelines on Federal Work Study. Supervisors, please expect to hear from your colleagues in Finance, Financial Aid and the People Center to help us gather all the necessary information to process payments to students.

Molly Pepper (mpepper@champlain.edu) in the Office of Financial Aid and Howie LeBlanco (leblanco@champlain.edu) in the People Center remain available to help answer any questions and are copied on this message.

Students, thank you for your many contributions to our community, you are important members of our teams and we all miss you.  

Take care,
Laurie