08/18/2022
By Steve O’Riordan

As we begin a new semester, our approach to COVID-19 continues to evolve to match public health guidance and the widespread availability of vaccines, face coverings, tests and treatments to prevent and mitigate the impact and spread of the disease.

As always, please monitor yourself daily for symptoms of COVID-19 or any illness and if you are ill, isolate at home or in your residence hall room.

UMass Lowell requires all students, employees and on-site vendors who live, learn, work or conduct research on campus, access campus resources, or participate in campus events be vaccinated for COVID-19 with a complete initial vaccine series. The university also highly recommends COVID-19 boosters for all eligible students and employees heading into the fall semester.

While the university’s limited surveillance testing program has ceased, faculty and staff should test if symptomatic or a close contact using readily available rapid tests available in local pharmacies. If positive, speak with your primary care provider and follow your department’s established protocol for absences from work. 

Consistent with our public health efforts even before the pandemic, UMass Lowell will continue to monitor and educate our students on ways to minimize the spread of any disease. Testing for students will continue to be available in the Wellness Center. Students need to call the Symptom Reporting Line (978-934-2682) or email Student_Symptomreporting@uml.edu for evaluation to determine if a test is warranted.

As recommended by the CDC, all campus positive cases should isolate for minimum five days and if symptoms continue isolate up to 10 days. Wear a mask until 10 days from your initial positive test. While there is no requirement to inform Human Resources of COVID-19 cases, we encourage you to consider informing known close contacts if you test positive.

UMass Lowell has maintained its increased ventilation measures, including leaving HEPA filters in rooms that require them.

If local, regional, or national conditions change, the campus reserves the right to reinstitute surveillance testing and other COVID mitigation measures.

While the number of cases nationally remains higher than anyone would like, we have more tools than ever before to minimize the impact of this disease. Every university community member has the right to choose to wear a face covering at any time and high-quality masks are widely available.

Please refer to the UMass Lowell COVID-19 web page for additional information.