There’s no Pride in not paying student workers

We all know the stereotype of the broke college student: pinching pennies, stealing snacks from the dining hall and eating ramen for all three meals. A lot of us have probably been there ourselves because being in college, especially at a school carrying Hofstra’s price tag, is really expensive. In the advent of COVID-19, that stereotype came to be the frightening reality for hundreds of Hofstra students as campus suddenly shut down, kicking them out of dorms and cutting off paychecks that so many student workers relied on for basic necessities.

In case a sudden increase in financial stress and the switch to online classes wasn’t enough, the whole situation is compounded by a metric ton of uncertainty. We don’t know how long it will be before we can see our friends again, or when we’ll have access to everything that our campus provided us. We don’t know how grading is going to work through Zoom, or how a Pass/Fail option will affect our academic futures. Student workers have no idea if they’ll be able to continue receiving a paycheck or work remotely. We have questions, and Hofstra just isn’t answering them.

I don’t doubt that the switch to working from home has been stressful for Hofstra’s administration – but they’re still getting a paycheck. There’s still no information on Hofstra’s COVID-19 FAQ page about student workers, and the Dean of Students’ Emergency Fund application was only made public a few days ago (and still hasn’t really been publicized in emails to the student body). 

Emails to various members of upper administration were returned with empty assurances – “We are monitoring the situation and considering the health and safety of our community” – that contain no actual help. Student workers have been left completely in the dark, and Hofstra doesn’t seem to be bothered by it.

Most of the time, the problems students encounter at Hofstra are pretty reflective of higher education as a whole. But this time around, Hofstra’s true colors are showing: many other schools, Harvard and Princeton among them, are paying student workers at least a portion of their lost wages. Hofstra has remained silent, leaving student workers to scramble to support each other through a mutual aid project and a GoFundMe page.

When I told a member of administration in a Zoom meeting this past week that it shouldn’t be up to students to take care of each other and that it’s Hofstra’s responsibility to pay workers like other schools are doing, he laughed and told me that he “[wishes] we had their budget.” I pay over $45,000 to attend Hofstra each year. In 2017, President Rabinowitz made $1.5 million. I think they’d be just fine continuing to pay student workers. 

It’s not just that it’s the right thing to do. Being able to continue receiving a paycheck while making the already difficult transition to online classes while navigating a global pandemic would relieve a lot of the stress put on the hundreds of students that Hofstra has decided to leave in the dust. Hofstra should be ashamed for discarding the people they rely on to function. There’s no “Pride” in abandoning the people that are supposed to be a part of the Hofstra “family.” 

While I worry about how my housemates and I are going to pay our rent or afford groceries, I hope Hofstra’s administration enjoys receiving their paychecks while they work from home. I hope the guilt of abandoning “members of the Pride” doesn’t keep them up too late at night.

Hofstra, I hope you know that students won’t forget that you had the choice to do better and chose not to.

Elliot Colloton is a sophomore sociology major and co-organizer of the Hofstra Student Workers Coalition.