“There Are Going to Be Things That We're Going to Try That Aren't Going to Work Exactly Right, or Sometimes Are not Going to Work at All”

The Resonance Test 53: Clayton Rose

Clayton Rose got the upper hand on COVID-19. Rose is the President of Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, and he has overseen the successful reopening of his school for the Fall 2020 semester. By reducing the on-campus student population; implementing strict testing, social distancing, and masking policies; and producing a stream of clear and continuous health reporting, the school’s COVID cases dropped from three to, as of the airing of this episode, zero. (Yes, zero.) Rose humbly says: “The congratulations really belong to our students and faculty and staff here” who complied.

Rose acknowledges that redesigning the fall student experience required being iterative, knowing that “there are going to be things that we're going to try that aren't going to work exactly right, or sometimes are not going to work at all. And you have to be open minded to adjusting or changing or just putting aside” whatever fails to make the grade.

In this back-to-school episode of The Resonance Test, producer Ken Gordon, who recently sent his own daughter to Bowdoin, throws a series of questions at the president. They talk about the importance of having first-year students on campus (and how non-first-years feel about this), reconfiguring collegiate space in the pandemic era, the intricacies of designing an effective COVID dashboard, and why his community needs to stay vigilant if they’re to keep the virus off campus.

Host: Kyle Wing
Editor: Kyp Pilalas
Producer: Ken Gordon