03/19/2021
By Joseph Hartman
With vaccinations accelerating nationwide and multiple semesters of COVID-19 lessons learned and effectively implemented behind us, we believe we will be able to create a safe, social and interpersonal living and learning experience for all our students on campus.
This spring we’ve already increased our on-campus populations in classrooms and our residence halls. We’ve all learned through their absence just how important person-to-person interactions are.
We will continue to adhere to national and state public health guidance in place, if any, come September. And while campus operations may not look identical to 2019 when the semester begins, university services ranging from student activities and the Rec Center to research and dining will all be finalizing and posting plans on the UMass Lowell website in the coming months to move as close to normal as possible.
And for the second consecutive year, UMass President Marty Meehan is recommending a tuition freeze, a move Chancellor Moloney and her administration strongly supports.
We certainly recognize that COVID-19 won’t disappear. In addition to continued enhanced cleaning and other public health measures, our weekly surveillance testing will continue. With a 0.4 positivity rate during the 2020-21 academic year out of more than 40,000 tests performed, UMass Lowell’s testing program has been essential to our ability to move forward. Thank you to our students for your responsible behavior in keeping our campus and our communities safe.
As vaccinations progress and the status of the virus is monitored, it is our hope this spring to be able to have more on-campus activities, especially outside as the weather gets warmer.
Given this trajectory, we also are planning for a different kind of Commencement celebration. While the formal ceremony will be virtual and streamed, we hope to have students receive their diploma covers in person in the Tsongas Center. Students, accompanied by two guests, will walk in, receive their diploma covers, have a photo taken, and walk out. Masks, social distancing and other risk reduction measures will be in place throughout. More details will be shared as they are finalized.
While we’re proud of what we’ve been able to accomplish during the most challenging year in memory, a university is its people and the discoveries and creations that come from their interactions.
We have so much to catch up on and I can’t wait to see you on campus again this spring, and in classes this summer or in the fall.