Vincenzo Vinzi Looks Back on One Year of COVID at ESSEC

Vincenzo Vinzi, dean and president of ESSEC Group, tells us how the school and its students made it through the past year of the COVID pandemic. 

ESSEC Alumni: In February 2020, the pandemic began spreading all over the world. What do you remember from this time?

Vincenzo Vinzi: At the beginning of February 2020, ESSEC held its International Advisory Board in New York. One of those present, who had travelled from China, joked that because he’d been in the States for over two weeks, there was no risk he’d infect us with COVID-19. Everyone there laughed. Nobody could foresee the global pandemic that would rock the world and put our lives on hold for more than a year.

EA: How did it start for ESSEC Group?

V. Vinzi: Over the course of February, it was through our Singapore campus that we really started to grasp the severity of the situation, with the strict preventative measures taken by the local government, despite the low number of cases. Meanwhile, France (and Europe in general) was still confident that the pandemic was nothing out of the ordinary and would have harmless results. As the month went on, the situation worsened and awareness grew through a reduction in contact with Asia, followed by the first cluster in Bas-Rhin (Alsace) following a gathering that showed just how quickly the virus could spread in a very short time-frame. The situation had also gotten worse in northern Italy, with a few towns in Lombardy entering the first lockdown on 21 February. This began to worry to management in higher education who, like me, had travelled to Milan for the EFMD Deans Conference at SDA Bocconi School of Management just one week earlier. 

EA: And then the threat was felt everywhere. How did ESSEC formulate its battle plan?

V. Vinzi: Everything picked up pace in early March, initially by giving willing students the opportunity to study remotely. That was on Wednesday 11 March, and at 8 p.m. the following day, President Emmanuel Macron announced that France was going into lockdown, with the closure of all educational establishments. On 13 March, ESSEC’s entire executive committee met in my office on our Cergy campus for a meeting that would last 12 hours. It was a memorable day of springing into action and crisis management, where all present showed cool heads and a sense of responsibility. 

EA: Were you aware at the time of what it would involve? How did you react?

V. Vinzi: At the time, we didn’t know that it would be the last time we all met together face-to-face. We were, though, all aware of the gravity of the situation, and the orders were clear enough for us to quickly take the decision that all classes in France would switch to online learning. This switch would happen immediately for all CPD, and with one week’s notice for our undergrad students, to give those students who could do so enough time to get home. The challenge was to communicate all of these measures clearly, accurately, and thoroughly to the diverse range of stakeholders that make up a school like ESSEC: students, attendees, professors, support staff, speakers, alumni, and partners. 

EA: What were your priorities?

V. Vinzi: From that moment on, it was important to me that this unprecedented crisis be an opportunity to innovate and evolve towards a more innovative mode with new methods of online learning and assessment, especially via our augmented digital campus that we had launched one year earlier, in February 2019, and which meant we could very quickly adapt to the new online learning environment. I would also like to use this opportunity to thank the ESSEC community for pulling together and embodying its values of responsibility, humanism, and citizen engagement. I was and remain convinced that periods of crisis are not there to be suffered through, but instead constitute a call to action to have a positive impact. The way things turned out proved to me that I was right to count on the engagement and responsibility of our community. And yet, we weren’t out of the woods yet.

EA: What about the situation for the group’s campuses outside of France? 

V. Vinzi: No sooner had we finished informing people of the measures for the Cergy and La Défense campuses, than Morocco announced it was closing its borders. A few weeks later, it was Singapore’s turn to implement a “circuit breaker” similar to the strict lockdown already in place in France. This meant that every ESSEC campus was closed to students. The entire community was working and studying online. This made it more important than ever to maintain the connections between all members of our school’s world, spread across three continents.

EA: What did you do to make sure this important connection was maintained?

V. Vinzi: So that the members of our community could stay in touch with each other, every week from 27 March I recorded a video from my balcony at home, which was sent out to the whole community, in France and English, every Friday. These weekly videos were designed to maintain a connection by making sure our vocation as a higher education and research establishment remained meaningful. Indeed, in the midst of a crisis, being in a grande école that works to generate and share knowledge is a bit of good luck, because it means you are already part of a community that is working to find solutions to new challenges and developing new models. We also implemented well-being initiatives from HR, with a working-from-home charter that guaranteed every one of us had a chance to switch off, so that we could maintain our work-life balance.

EA: Were the campuses completely empty?

V. Vinzi: Our campuses were never completely closed, including during the first, very strict lockdown, but were running at an absolute minimum (maintenance, mail services, etc.). I came back for the very first time on 11 May, just after the lockdown was eased. From then until the summer holidays, we gave our staff who were eligible for working from home the possibility of coming into the office for up to two days per week, while the academic year would end online for our students. I remember these weeks leading up to July, with the fine weather of a springtime that had never been sweeter, nor our campuses so quiet. It was like we were in the middle of August, while online our classes, and then exams, were running at full throttle, and our teaching and support staff were working flat out. It was a bit surreal, and it was hard to swallow because, for an academic community, seeing students and course attendees on campus is our whole reason for being here. It’s what makes our work meaningful and gets us out of bed every morning.

EA: With no real visibility of what the future held, what adaptations did you put into place?

V. Vinzi: That period was a very intense one, as we prepared for the new academic year in September. At ESSEC, I decided to invest €2.5 m in fitting out all of our classrooms with dual teaching equipment over the summer, and our teams did some amazing work so that by the time that September came round, all of our campuses could deliver mixed classroom-based/online classes. The hard work our professors put into their teaching plans also deserves to be applauded. In just a few months they were able to adapt to deliver 100% online and dual teaching effectively, which are two completely different teaching methods. Once again, we have the engagement of the community to thank for enabling ESSEC to continue delivering a quality experience. And for planning a new academic year that was unlike any other.

EA: Could you say that the new academic year got off to something of a normal start?

V. Vinzi: When the new academic year on our different programmes began in September, the first positive note was that most of our international students had been able to reach the school, whether in France, Singapore, or Morocco. In Cergy, we set up a system of 50% capacity for each classroom, with students alternating between a week in class and a week online. The system worked really well, with excellent compliance with the protective measures in place on our campuses, which are definitely among the safest places to avoid infection, thanks to our major investment in health equipment (almost €300,000), as well as to everyone demonstrating sound personal responsibility. 

EA: Unfortunately, this semblance of normality was suddenly curtailed for the second time in late October, with a new lockdown and our campuses being closed to students... 

V. Vinzi: We were back to working online. This time it was a faster transition, thanks to the experience gained during the first lockdown, but we were under no illusions that we would be reopening any time before Christmas. It was not until 8 February that students were able to gradually return to campus, with the maximum capacity set at 20%. So that’s at least two academic years unlike any other. They will leave us with new habits and teaching methods, taking advantage of both digital technology and classroom-based learning to enhance, rather than replace, how we usually do things: a new normal for higher education.

EA: What was it like for your students and course attendees on and off campus? 

V. Vinzi: We paid a lot of attention to the well-being of our students and course attendees, in a situation where isolation could be very damaging to their mental health. That’s why I wanted us to encourage them to travel to campus part-time, as often as possible, using dual teaching from August 2020. The combination of the preventive measures taken on campus, our investment in technology, and the responsible behaviour of students and course attendees helped us to strike the right balance and deliver a learning experience within the constraints of enhanced safety measures.

EA: Despite all these efforts, many suffered terrible consequences for their mental health...

V. Vinzi: As you know, the series of lockdowns – in France in particular – forced us to close down our campuses twice, for many long weeks at a time. It was a difficult experience for students in our halls of residence, far from their families, but also for those who had been able to travel home. Returning home could reveal or exacerbate isolation, unequal access to computer equipment and finances, and uncertainty for the future, all while exposing students to the effect the pandemic was having on other members of the family. In an effort to support them as best we could, we drew on the experience of our two counsellors and the student nurse (to read the ESSEC Alumni article about them, click here) who did a great job in being there to listen to our students, as well as educating them in spotting signs of distress in their classmates. I am very proud of the solidarity they showed amongst each other, especially in our halls of residence. We also have a partner organisation available to support students abroad.

EA: And how are you managing the public health situation on a day-to-day basis?

V. Vinzi: The measures we have put in place are helping us to handle this unprecedented crisis for the school on a day-to-day basis, without seeing a large number of people testing positive for COVID-19 within the ESSEC community. Back in March 2020, we created a dedicated crisis team to implement and coordinate public health recommendations within the group, as well as to equip our campuses with public health equipment. Then, in September, ESSEC formed a COVID cell made up of three members, including one nurse. This team handles requests from students and staff, manages cases of self-isolation, and traces contacts. It works in close cooperation with the Val-d’Oise regional health authority. All of our students and staff can receive free COVID tests at the test centre that opened on the campus in early February. This comprehensive strategy enables us to provide a safe environment for our students and course attendees.

Check out this retrospective of the past year at ESSEC in images!

Interview by François de Guillebon, Editor in Chief of Reflets ESSEC Magazine

Image: © Christophe Meireis