Answering the call: Harpur College aids in COVID-19 response

With the rapid rise of COVID-19 cases in New York state, healthcare facilities and governments put out a call for help — particularly for dwindling supplies, such as face masks. Faculty and staff at Binghamton University’s Harpur College of Arts and Sciences quickly mobilized in response.

So far, 39 individuals offered up the contents of their labs, eager to help, said Carl Lipo, Harpur’s associate dean for research and programs. They include faculty in biological sciences, psychology, anthropology, chemistry, physics, history, art and design, geography, geological sciences, integrative neuroscience, the First-Year Research Immersion, Classical and Near-Eastern Studies and more.

“Faculty have been tremendously generous in their willingness to help out and we are all really grateful,” he said.

Items donated include hand sanitizer and tissues from the Music Department; surgical masks, safety glasses and lab coats from science classrooms in multiple disciplines; cleaning supplies from anthropology and sterile surgical instruments from biological sciences.

It doesn’t stop there: thermocyclers, DNA spin columns and ethyl alcohol for sterilization have been donated. Departments also offered the use of 3D printers, including anthropology, chemistry and psychology, and faculty and staff alike volunteered their skills for future use, from lab testing to manufacturing.

Even before the official request came, biological sciences technician Nancy McGee reached out to department chair Karin Sauer, asking if she could donate teaching supplies to a local hospital.

“She answered immediately with an enthusiastic ‘YES!’” McGee recounted. Staff from the University’s Office of Environmental Health and Safety went from lab to lab to collect supplies.

The Department of Art and Design assembled all the safety supplies from its studios and made them available to the Broome County Emergency Operations Center, said department chair Natalija Mijatović. The tally included 67 individual masks, most of which are N95 particulate respirator masks, as well as 29 boxes of gloves, 52 pairs of safety glasses, six plastic face shields and 250 alcohol antiseptic pads.

Art and Design Associate Professor Blazo Kovacevic and Sculpture Studio Technician Lou Fuchs also found a way to hand-produce plastic face visors, although further research revealed that a local manufacturer is already working on an order for UHS. “We decided not to proceed as it would not be nearly as useful, but we are looking into other ways to help,” Mijatović said.

Ann and D. Andrew Merriwether enlisted the help of friend Marianne Bauer, who is sewing fabric masks at the home they share. Ann, a lecturer in psychology, is also part of a fiber arts guild, and has helped connect interested volunteers with the mask-making group. Elastic has been a limiting factor, she said.

“These are essentially mask-covers to make the respirator masks last longer, although we are lining some with unused HEPA vacuum cleaner bag parts as a filter,” explained Andrew Merriwether, professor and chair of anthropology. “They are pleated so they expand to cover your nose.”

Others have found different ways to share their skills in a time of crisis, such as English Professor Liz Rosenberg, who is conducting public readings on Facebook twice a day for both children and adults.

“I have been enormously proud and impressed by all of the efforts of my Harpur colleagues to help others — near and far — during this global crisis,” said Harpur Dean Elizabeth Chilton. “We are leveraging the best of the arts and sciences to help each other and our students, and benefit society in a time of great need. Together we will get through this.”