COVID-19, or the coronavirus, is challenging our university communities. At CFA, our tenure-line faculty, lecturer faculty, librarians, counselors and coaches are not alone. We are stronger together.
Visit CFA’s COVID-19 resources pages to see our updates to faculty, pertinent contract provisions, mutual aid, helpful links, and more.
Check this page regularly for updates on CFA’s advocacy for the health and safety of students, faculty and staff. We’re also providing resources for faculty to navigate the many issues the coronavirus pandemic presents.
In these bizarre times of social isolation brought on by the coronavirus, we are thinking about you.
We want to know how you are faring and if you are interested in participating in a mutual aid effort with fellow faculty who live in your same zip code. You might be someone with skills or resources to offer. You might be a person able to help your fellow neighbor or union member in need with errands. You may also be someone in need.
Mutual aid can happen between two, twenty, or hundreds of people. A good place to start is with your “people.” Whether that is a close friend, folks from a community organization, your neighbor, or co-workers whom you may not know well, but have helped you in this past. It is important to assess who would show up for you in a crisis or emergency, and who you’d do the same for.
While we hope you will become part of your CFA chapter’s mutual aid outreach effort, we understand that you may already be stretched due to the added demands of working virtually while maintain family responsibilities. Still, we encourage you to download and fill out CFA’s mutual aid flier and our pod mapping worksheet to help you make an emergency plan (see how to use it below). The map was originally developed by Mia Mingus for the Bay Area Transformative Justice Collective and has been adapted to help folks assess whom they can rely on and vice versa.
How to use the pod mapping worksheet:
Start by writing your name in the center.
Then, fill in the dark circles with specific names, as well as the help each person can provide. For example: Can your neighbor with a generator charge your wheelchair when the electricity is out? Is there someone who can buy and drop off groceries or pick up medicine? What about a friend who will take care of you when you are sick? Talk to people and ask them what they are able to provide.
Ask those you’ve written into the dark circles what they need from you to be in their pod, or let them know what you can offer.
The dotted lines are people who are moveable—they could become part of your pod with conversation and relationship building. Potentially, this could be faculty colleagues living in your vicinity.
The larger circles on the outside are larger community groups, networks, and organizations that could be resources for you.
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