Now, Stanley is running the university from his home at Cowles House on MSU's campus.

"I'm very aware that for students, faculty and staff, this is a very, very stressful and trying time," Stanley said in a recent interview with The State News Editorial Board. "But I'm amazed at the job people are doing. It's really amazing to me how faculty stepped up on very short notice, as you're all aware, to begin the transition to remote teaching ... I'm incredibly impressed by what the students have done, and the patience, really, that you've had."

Editor's note: Responses have been condensed for length and clarity.

What are you most proud of from your first year at MSU, and what is the one thing that you wanted to accomplish this year, but didn't get to?

I'm really proud of ... how people have risen to the occasion during this crisis. Sometimes, this really is what tests people and tests an institution — how they respond. And again, I'm so proud of the students. And I look not just at what we're doing in terms of continuing teaching, continuing the normal functions of the university, but what we've been doing to reach out to the community as well.

Some of the students from the College of Medicine, College of Osteopathic Medicine, College of Nursing graduated early. They've just received their degrees now in April, so they can go out and help in the community. ... I’m really proud of that, ... I'm really proud that this is what Spartans do.

In terms of not getting things done, there are always things I haven't finished so far that I would like to see done. One of the things is, I still am concerned about intramural facilities for students. And that, to me, is a challenge.

At the beginning of your administration, you laid out some goals such as making campus safer, making it more accountable and making steps toward changing the culture surrounding sexual assault. Do you think you've been able to restore trust in the administration?

You know, you'd probably be better equipped to answer whether we've restored trust administration. ... I think that's a challenging thing to do, because trust has to be earned. When you say you care about something, your actions actually reflect that. And so I hope I've been good in that.

I do think that one of the things we've done is really changed the personnel in those offices. So bringing in Tanya Jachimiak to lead the office that's involved in Title IX essentially, and to be the single point of contact for all those issues around the university.

How would you identify the biggest issues that the university is currently facing?

So (the impact of COVID-19) is obviously one of them, and it's just a safety issue, obviously — how do we do things and yet keep everybody as safe as possible? And that's been our goal from the beginning, it's why we moved so quickly to distance people. And then (there's) the financial consequences of this.

At the same time, selecting the provost for the university, I think, is an important challenge.

And then (diversity, equity and inclusion) continues to be important. We set up a very important committee to help drive that and we had a search on for a chief diversity officer to help lead that, (but) those things have been postponed, so I'm concerned about that, and I'm concerned in general that those things aren't lost sight of during the crisis we face now.

So those are some of the things that I'm thinking about, but mostly, I'm thinking about the safety of everybody. ... As difficult as this is, we will get through this. We'll get through this as an institution, we'll get through this as a state, we will get through it.