Update for students returning from Casa Artom

This message was sent by Dr. Page West, Professor, Strategy & Entrepreneurship on March 4:

Ciao to all,

I hope your travel back was uneventful and stress-free. Linda and I had a smooth ride, leaving Casa Artom at 5:15 Sunday with Riley and Elaina, then connecting through Frankfurt, Wash DC, and finally home to Greensboro. Surprisingly, nowhere on our trip did we encounter a spot check for the virus. But I understand that the US has since implemented this for travelers coming from Italy.

Although a number of you and your parents or family wanted us to stay in Venezia and see this thing through, I am sure they all love having you back. It’s a little bit of a silver lining that we get to see family sooner than we were going to otherwise.

So I wanted to give you an update on a few things that we are all working on back at Wake, in anticipation of getting back together after spring break. Not all of this is completely done yet, still a “work in process.” This sort of event has never before occurred at Wake, so we are newly inventing as we go. There are many moving parts in the university, and a number of constraints that we have to work around.

Courses. A complete schedule is being worked out so that all the courses you were taking in Italy can be continued here. We do not yet have all the days / times worked out, but we will share this with you soon. My classes will of course be taught by me. I know that Agnese is planning to meet with you in real time via Webex for Art, with the assistance of Professor Bernadine Barnes. The Venice Today, History, and Econ courses are likely to be some mixture of online instruction as well as real time – still to be worked out. The advanced Italian sections 153 and 213 will likely be done in an online, asynchronous environment. Italian 113, by its nature, is the only one that I think will be different since it requires a high level of in-class interaction. As with 113 in Venezia this class will meet 4 days per week.

As we get details ironed out on all this, I will be back in touch.

Parking. We are looking into the provision of parking passes for all who want them, for the balance of the spring. We will let you know soon on this, so that you can make appropriate plans for getting back to campus. I want you to know that this detail has not been forgotten.

Housing. Everyone signed up for room assignments, and I know this is far less than ideal. Remember that RLH has stated that any Casa Artom student may live off campus this spring if desired. This presents an opportunity to avoid strange living circumstances and join up with other Casa Artom students for March and April. (Also remember the conditions: for those of you who are sophomores, next year you would still need to live on campus).

Fees. If anyone incurred change fees for their return trips, the university will consider some sort of reimbursement for those with financial hardship. My suggestion is to prepare a summary statement of the fees incurred and the reason, scan copies of your fee receipts, and include your name address and contact information. Then submit these in one document (not a whole series of attachments) to the Global Studies Assistant Dean David Taylor. His email address is taylordf@wfu.edu.

Finally – and most importantly, Community. We will be working hard to maintain the community and camaraderie that we have developed this semester. I started yesterday contacting people I know in this area to serve as guest speakers to our group, and to visit interesting sites that have to do with global business. No promises – but I’m looking into a trip to the BMW factory in South Carolina, and I’m already in conversation with Raffaldini Winery not far from here about coming to visit them. More on all this later – probably when you get back to campus.

In addition, Linda and I very much want to continue our community dinners on Wednesday evenings, at our house most every week. We look forward to hanging with everyone just as we have been doing so far through the term. This is one reason I have made sure that my longer seminar class on capitalism is scheduled for later Wednesday afternoon.

I will be talking with others around campus about what more we can do. But I would also love to hear YOUR ideas about keeping our group intact. Please send me your ideas!!

I hope this quick summary is a little helpful. Let your family know that things are in the works. And please contact me if you have any other questions or comments, and especially with your ideas about keeping our group together.

With all best wishes,

Page West, Ph.D
Professor, Strategy & Entrepreneurship
School of Business
Wake Forest University