By Deborah J. Cohan

It’s early morning when I receive a message from the university updating us about plans for Fall 2020. This time it’s in the form of a music video, with Olivia Newton John’s “Let’s Get Physical” in the background, complete with the following chants:

Hey everybody, let’s bend and flex. We need you agile and nimble. We are going all out here. High impact! Higher! Come on, flex yourself longer and stronger. Flexibility is the key! Yeh, that’s it. Keep it going. You can do it. Just one more set. Don’t stop now! More, more, come on!!

Be a team player in this relay race! Just because the person who handed you his class is short of breath and about to drop dead, don’t stop! You can do it! Grab it but don’t let go of yours! Come on, you can do it, it’s up to you!

Remember your objectives! If you want great outcomes and deliverables, we’ve got to keep this looking state of the art. We have to pivot to be ready for the next delivery. When we finish, we’ll keep our gloves and shields on and clean every apparatus in here.

Rather than bend and flex, I pause and reflect, two exercises that have gone missing in higher education. I start journaling:

Am I talking about exercise classes being promoted at the newest gym in the area? No, I’m talking about higher education as it is getting exponentially lowered in this country. HyFlex sounds like what that beefy guy at the gym uses to build strength, endurance and flexibility all at the same time. The other term thrown around is BlendFlex which sounds more like kitchen equipment. The thing is, none of it sounds like what needs to happen in a classroom.

I retreat to my sunroom to work on my book, take a walk, and start dinner. I check email one last time before settling in for the evening. That’s when I discover this message, sent of course at 4:59PM on Friday:

Dear Faculty,

Like Burger King, we want to remind our students that the purpose of education and of life is to, “Be your way.” To this end, here are some of the special initiatives we are implementing. We have tasked multiple working groups that have never met to concoct plans for which you will be responsible.

All campus operations will be like a restaurant; we’ll offer the full dine-in experience plus carry out, drive-thru and delivery, and always with an ever-expanding menu of options catering to the individual needs of our thousands of students. Here at Flex U, we are prioritizing everyone and everything all at the same time because your safety and health are oh so important; you will simultaneously prioritize the students in front of you, the people coming to you via screens, and everyone who tunes in later. If anyone has questions at 2am, you will get texts so you can respond immediately. Think of our campus evolving into a 24-hour store and Michelin star experience!

To manage these necessary and important transitions, we will be hiring more Deans. Despite the hiring freezes, furloughs, reduction to retirement, elimination of travel for research, and reduced health care benefits, we will be hiring a Dean of Hybridization, Dean of Flexibility, Dean of Conveniences, Dean of HyFlex Assessment, and a Dean of HyFlex Honors. We will merge our Teaching and Learning Center with our new HyFlex Makerspace and rename it the Cluster of HyFlex.

We’re now flexing across the curriculum.

We’ll be re-branding the First Year Experience and marketing it to prospective students as FlexFirst.

In order to get paid, you will need to text each of your students, instructing them to reply, “Flex My Way” to your cell. Here at Flex U, we provide full access and the personal touch!

Who needs the library when you can have the hybrary? Hybrarians are replacing librarians.

We’re aiming for senior seminars and capstones to all become HySems and HyStones. We know they sound like hymens and kidney stones but these will catch on, we promise.

We’ll rely fully on personal responsibility, and refer to the transition period between classes as HySanFlex. That’s when you’ll sanitize your classrooms before and after teaching. It’s only polite. There are ten whole minutes between classes. You don’t need to eat, get fresh air after lecturing in a mask, or use the bathroom. No one notices anymore if you’re wearing a cute outfit so you may as well start wearing Depends. It will save time and you won’t need to use the public restroom. No more flatulating in the stall next to students. It’s a win-win.

We’ll skip the retirement parties with the usual roasting and office banter. We’re arranging some fun HyFlexroasts where the people who don’t want to attend the in-person party on a Saturday night can zoom in to special breakout rooms and chat, that is if anyone shows up.

Instead of the annual holiday party, we are hosting a cleaning party in August, and everyone will get a bag of party favors with a mask with the college colors and mascot, a bottle of sanitizer, and wipes. We’ll have a raffle, and two winners will get plexiglass since we weren’t able to afford that for everyone this year. The grand prize will be a $25 contribution to a plot at the cemetery of your choice.

During exam week, we sponsor events to help reduce stress. This year we’re trying something new since we’ll be fully online after Thanksgiving. Student Life is hard at work planning virtual events like Flex Massage and Pet the Puppies that students can do from anywhere! It will be a blast!

Students will be gyrating along with us. They understand the need to distance, so we’ll be doing campaigns to bring masturbation into focus as the way to build healthy sexuality. We’ve invited Betty Dodson, author of Sex for One, to be our special October speaker. Along with Student Government and the LGBTQIA+ Association, we’ll be stimulating discourse, sponsoring HyFlexSex workshops, and promoting the new FlexBlendVibe. These are unprecedented times so we’ll permit occasional BlendPongandBong parties.

Students must experience the HyFlex experience 24 hours a day. We’re equipping residence halls with sleep number beds to cater to each person’s individual needs.

We’ll offer HyFlex Abroad! Those who prefer to not travel can do it virtually! It promises to be an adventure!

The Strategic Plan will focus on HyFlex service learning with blended experiential opportunities to leverage community engagement toward measurable HyFlex impact practice.

At FlexU, we take customer-oriented convenience and choices to the next level!

Cheers,

Richard Whiteman, Ph.D.
Provost

Deborah J. Cohan’s first book is Welcome to Wherever We Are: A Memoir of Family, Caregiving, and Redemption. Cohan is a professor of sociology at the University of South Carolina-Beaufort, a contributing writer for Psychology Today online, a frequent contributor to Inside Higher Ed, and is regularly featured as an expert for national media on a range of social issues. She has been cited in: CNN, MSN, Real Simple, Good Housekeeping, USA Today, US News & World Report, Cosmopolitan, Martha Stewart Weddings, Brides, Elite Daily, Utne Reader, The Washington Post, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, TODAY, Bankrate, Vox, Slate, Vice News, Huffington Post, Bustle, Romper, The Chronicle of Higher Education, and The Christian Science Monitor.