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 * Sections
   * Critical Risks
   * Risk Management
   * The Insurance Industry
   * Claims & The Law
   * Workers’ Comp Forum
   * Risk Insiders
   * Sector Focus
   * .
   * Risk Central
   * Power Broker
   * Risk Matrix
   * The Profession
   * Risk Scenarios
   * Risk All Stars
   * Teddy Award
   * Sponsored Content
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   * Digital Issue
   * Issue Archive
   * Subscribe
 * Conferences
   * Ergo
   * National Comp
 * Advertise
 * Subscribe
 * More
   * Award Applications
   * Newsletters
   * &BrandStudio
   * Privacy Policy
   * About R&I
   * Contact Us

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HOW NORWICH UNIVERSITY’S PRESIDENT STEPPED INTO HIS STUDENTS’ SHOES AND BECAME A
TRUE ADVOCATE DURING COVID

This university president moved quickly to preserve student mental health during
the onset of the pandemic by living in the dorms.
By: Nina Luckman | September 2, 2021
Topics: Profiles | Risk All Stars | Risk Management | September 2021 Issue



The hallmarks of young adult life for many include the transition from high
school to college, the exploration of career opportunities through internships,
and importantly, living in a shared setting with peers, often for the first
time.

For 18 months now, those essential coming-of-age transition points have been
stunted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Universities instituted isolation mandates on campuses last year, but none of
them did what Norwich University president Mark Anarumo did — live under these
conditions in the dorms themselves.

“We had to balance COVID infection rates against a depressed state of mental
health, it was very frustrating,” Anarumo said. “That age group is not built to
go into any kind of isolation, but we didn’t want to have COVID infection rates
be the only metric for evaluating health.”

Anarumo lived in two different dorms, one on each side of the campus, to provide
the type of empathetic leadership that showed administrative solidarity with
students.

What he discovered was far more profound.

He provided his personal cell phone number to students so that they could call
and voice concerns, or even if they just needed space to vent.

“I did that so no one would knock on my door and break quarantine rules, because
I wanted to make sure I was doing things correctly. My cell phone [number] made
the rounds very aggressively. I was getting calls literally from about 6 a.m. to
about 4 a.m. in a 24-hour cycle,” he said.

“Some people were just curious if it was real or not, but some of the most
endearing exchanges were calls at 2 a.m. wanting to FaceTime from the dorm room
across the hall and wanting to compare rooms. You could see on their faces in
the course of a 15 minute FaceTime they knew we understood and that the school
is with them.”

However, some conversations waded into different territory.

“My most powerful exchange was in the stairwell of the dorm at 3 in the morning.
I saw these eyes peering up from the stairwell. This young man came apart in the
stairwell and said, ‘I need to be here, I don’t think people understand what it
means for me and my friends to be on campus. Please fight and don’t let them
send us home,’ ” Anarumo recalled.

“I also got some calls where students said they heard me speak about mental
health and that they weren’t in a good place — them crying, me crying, and then
they would explain their family situation.”



These cases led to a major financial decision for NU.

At Anarumo’s behest, leadership decided to refund prorated room and board for
students who chose to leave the dorms. Despite the fact that this decision
caused the university to operate at a loss for the year, Anarumo sees it as the
only correct choice.

“We look at individual health in a holistic way where you can say, it’s not just
about COVID rates, but looking at university health, if you just look at it
fiscally, it was a terrible decision. What finally broke the conversation is
when I asked, ‘What is the cash value of a young man or woman who takes their
own life on campus?’ ” he said.

Ultimately, the decision paid dividends.

Anarumo emphasized the role older adults must play in mental health advocacy for
burgeoning adults: “They deserve us fighting for them.” &

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Every year, Risk & Insurance selects deserving candidates to become Risk All
Stars. These are risk managers who, through their perseverance, passion and
creativity, make a big difference to the stability of their organizations.

See all the 2021 Risk All Star Winners here.

Nina Luckman is a business journalist based in New Orleans, focusing primarily
on the workers' compensation industry. Over the last several years, Nina has
served as Editor of Louisiana Comp Blog, a news site she started in 2014 under
the auspices of a group self-insurance fund. She can be reached at
riskletters@theinstitutes.org.





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4 CRITICAL EMPLOYMENT PRACTICES AND FIDUCIARY LEGAL AND REGULATORY RISKS

These four risk trends are contributing to a challenging EPLI and fiduciary
insurance market.
By: Berkshire Hathaway Specialty Insurance | May 2, 2022

Companies of all sizes may be surprised at the ongoing hardening of the
employment practices liability (EPL) and fiduciary insurance markets.

For the past few years, terms have been tightening, limits have been reduced and
retentions have gone up. All this, largely due to a society that is more
litigious than ever and aggressive plaintiffs’ bars.

“Premiums are going up, but not as dramatically as the retentions in these
cases,” said Rhonda Prussack, senior vice president and head of fiduciary and
employment practices liability at Berkshire Hathaway Specialty Insurance.

“In order to stay profitable, insurers really have to respond to what’s going on
with the more aggressive plaintiffs’ bars and with all these new regulations.”

Consequently, it’s more important than ever that insureds are paying attention
to any legal and regulatory actions that could affect their coverages as they
prepare for increased underwriting scrutiny. Here are four to keep an eye on.


1) COVID LITIGATION

Rhonda Prussack, Senior Vice President and Head of Fiduciary and Employment
Practices Liability, Berkshire Hathaway Specialty Insurance

Employment practices liability insurance lines are feeling the pain of COVID
litigation.

“We initially thought that COVID would produce a lot of litigation, and it has,”
Prussack said. “People are alleging that they’ve been discriminated against.”

A wide range of COVID mandates and policies could lead to EPL lawsuits.

Employees may sue over vaccine mandates, mask mandates or return-to-office
policies if they feel they have disabilities that are not being accommodated
after months of proving they can work remotely.

Health care, manufacturing and retail organizations are seeing the most
lawsuits, but they can occur in any sector, Prussack said.

Underwriters are already eyeing these exposures, so it’s important for insureds
to be prepared to address what they’re doing to manage these risks before
renewal.

“You’ll see specific questions around COVID, around return-to-work practices,
and whether those practices or the protocols have been reviewed by an employment
attorney,” Prussack said.


2) WAGE TRANSPARENCY LAWS

A number of states and cities have passed wage transparency laws over the past
few years.

These laws require employers to be upfront about salary during the hiring
process and can be broken into two categories: those that require salary
disclosure upon request and those that require employers disclose it
proactively.

California was the first state to enact a wage transparency law in 2018, when it
passed a law requiring employers to provide a pay scale to external applicants,
upon request, if they had completed an initial interview for a job.

Maryland, and the cities Toledo and Cincinnati enacted similar laws soon after
and Washington state enacted an expanded law that requires employers to provide
a pay scale to internal and external applicants upon request.

In 2021, several more states enacted their own pay transparency laws, with
Colorado, Connecticut, Nevada and Rhode Island passing laws that require
employers to proactively disclose pay scales. Colorado’s law even requires
employers to post it in the job listing.

New York City is also putting a law on the books that requires employers to give
a pay scale range in every job posting.

These laws open employers up to the risk of discrimination lawsuits if, for
example, a woman finds out she is being paid less than a man for similar work.

“This will ultimately lead to more litigation as employees learn what their
value is at a company, and learn what people are being paid for similar work,”
Prussack said.


3) BIOMETRIC PRIVACY

Back in 2008, Illinois passed a law called the Biometric Information Privacy Act
(BIPA), which prohibits companies from collecting biometric data —like
fingerprints, iris scans or facial recognition — unless they obtain written
consent.

Since then, companies have been at increased risk of class-action lawsuits from
consumers — and potentially even from their own employees — alleging that they
collected biometric data without proper disclosures or without obtaining proper
consent.

Prussack said there have been about 1,000 lawsuits that have come out of
Illinois’ law alone, so far. Now other states are considering whether to pass
similar legislation.

“More and more states are considering similar laws with private rights of
action,” Prussack said.

The risk of lawsuits as biometric technology has proliferated is now so high
that many insurers are excluding it from their EPLI policies.

“With respect to those privacy regulations, like Illinois’ BIPA, exclusions for
that are quite common now across the industry,” Prussack said.

Employers can try to stay ahead of these risks by ensuring they are in
compliance with the laws in the most restrictive states. Right now, that means
ensuring they’re in compliance with Illinois’ law.

“It’s probably a good idea to try, regardless of where you’re headquartered or
where your employees are, to make sure you’re in adherence with more restrictive
laws,” Prussack said.


4) FEE CASES

On the fiduciary end, fee cases remain problematic for employers. In these class
action suits, plaintiffs allege that their 401(k), or in the case of nonprofits
403 (b), have been charged unnecessarily expensive fees.

“Those fees, the plaintiffs allege, cause employees to have less available in
their accounts for retirement,” Prussack said.

In the past, these lawsuits have focused on retirement plans with more than $1
billion in assets, but Prussack said that plaintiffs are going after
increasingly smaller plans. She’s seen suits targeting plans with less than $100
million in assets.

“They’re going after smaller and smaller plans,” Prussack said. “Now, the sweet
spot for the litigation seems to be in plans with $100 million in assets or
more, but just recently, a plan with less than $70 million in assets was sued.”


WHEN IT COMES TO INSURANCE PARTNERS, TRANSPARENCY IS KEY

Given these critical risks and a challenging fiduciary and employment liability
insurance market, it’s imperative that companies partner with a carrier that is
transparent about their policies and claims process.

Berkshire Hathaway Specialty Insurance prides itself on its transparency through
all stages of the claims process. The first step? Making sure insureds
understand their policy language. “We will freely discuss the policy and talk
about our intent in the language,” Prussack said.

This dedication stems from Berkshire Hathaway Specialty Insurance’s mission of
putting claims first. Their claims team will work with insureds every step of
the way to make sure they understand the process. Team members are constantly
meeting with customers to ensure a smooth process.

“Our motto is: ‘Claims is our product.’ And we really live that every day,”
Prussack said. “Our claims folks are always meeting with our customers. There’s
this high level of confidence and comfort with how we’re going to handle a
claim.”

For more information, please visit: https://bhspecialty.com/.





This article was produced by the R&I Brand Studio, a unit of the advertising
department of Risk & Insurance, in collaboration with Berkshire Hathaway
Specialty Insurance. The editorial staff of Risk & Insurance had no role in its
preparation.

The information contained herein is for general informational purposes only and
does not constitute an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy any
product or service. Any description set forth herein does not include all policy
terms, conditions and exclusions. Please refer to the actual policy for complete
details of coverage and exclusions.

Berkshire Hathaway Specialty Insurance (www.bhspecialty.com) provides commercial
property, casualty, healthcare professional liability, executive and
professional lines, surety, travel, programs, accident and health, medical stop
loss, and homeowners insurance. The actual and final terms of coverage for all
product lines may vary. It underwrites on the paper of Berkshire Hathaway's
National Indemnity group of insurance companies, which hold financial strength
ratings of A++ from AM Best and AA+ from Standard & Poor's.







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