Mississippi State University, Mississippi University for Women and East Mississippi Community College all plan on utilizing a hybrid method of in-person and online courses this fall.
Classes for all three schools are scheduled to begin on Aug. 17. MUW and MSU plan on finishing the semester around Thanksgiving, with both electing to not have a fall break this year. EMCC will have an abbreviated Thanksgiving break and plans to conclude the semester by early December. At each institution, both staff and students will be required to wear a face covering while on campus.
“The guidance from the state college board is for all public universities in Mississippi to return for the fall 2020 semester,” said MSU Chief Communications Officer Sid Salter. “At this point, there’s been no contradiction of that policy since it was adopted, so we have no choice but to comply with that. Obviously with the daily (COVID-19) reports, it certainly appears to be a fluid situation. … We can’t wait until there’s certainty to make those plans, hence the Safe Return document on our website.”
According to MSU’s Comprehensive Health and Safety Plan, in-person classrooms can be no more than 50 percent full. All residential students will be required to complete a temperature screening every 24 hours, while all employees will be required to conduct a self-screening daily prior to coming to work. Testing for students that show COVID-19 symptoms will be facilitated through the Longest Student Health Center.
Students will have an extended move-in period over the course of several days. Meanwhile, Housing and Residence Life will require face coverings in all common spaces. Visitors to residence halls will be limited. Residential MSU students who have tested positive for COVID-19 or are suspected to have COVID-19 will be isolated in a separate location.
According to Salter, residence halls on MSU’s campus have a capacity of 4,826 beds. He added the residence halls will be at full capacity with a mix of double and single rooms, but said there will not be any triple rooms available this fall. All first-year students have been accommodated and upper-division students who could not be accommodated were referred to College View, an apartment complex in Starkville.
Density of dining halls and campus eateries will follow physical-distancing guidelines and state public health guidance.
According to Salter, since the inception of COVID-19 in Mississippi, MSU has tested a total of 700 individuals with 45 positive cases and no deaths. Salter said the university has not set a policy regarding how many positive COVID-19 case numbers it would take to be considered an outbreak.
“In terms of an outbreak, I don’t think we’ve set a definition that isn’t in line with the CDC or the state department of health,” Salter said.
Salter said if there is an outbreak on campus, the university’s board of trustees will determine contingency plans.
“Right now, that’s the guidance we are bound to operate under, and we will continue to do that until the circumstances change,” Salter said. “Those changes will filter through what the CDC and the state department of health and the governor’s office and the state college board gives us.”
‘There will be COVID on this campus’
At MUW, President Nora Miller said in 2019, 52 percent of courses were offered online. She estimates that number will leap to around 75 percent in 2020.
“We’re still finalizing class schedules and determining what is best taught face-to-face,” Miller said. “Our class sizes are relatively small with most being under 20. But most classrooms with physical distancing will only hold six to eight people safely.”
MUW is exploring adding cameras to various classrooms to capture lessons for students to access virtually, according to Miller.
Miller said each day “remains fluid,” and the university could switch to online only should any potential outbreak occur. Miller said there isn’t a set amount of confirmed cases that would necessitate a shutdown of campus.
“We don’t have a magic number,” Miller said. “It’s going to fluctuate based on what’s happening in the community, what the availability is of hospital beds are and what the advice is from the CDC and the state department of health.”
When asked about the feasibility of getting through the fall semester without an outbreak occurring, Miller said intuition will just have to handle it case-by-case.
“There will be COVID on this campus,” Miller said. “I hope there won’t be, but I just think with the way it is we are likely to have some cases here. We will have space for quarantine and for self isolation, but we are going to encourage students who come down with it to go to their permanent residence if they can.”
MUW has the capacity for about 550 students to live in residence halls, Miller said. Miller couldn’t give a definitive number on how many students MUW will house on campus this fall but estimated it would be less than 400. As for the remaining students who would normally occupy the residence halls but will not in 2020, Miller said she’s hopeful that situation will resolve itself.
“A good many of them will have all online classes, so they may not have a need for housing and will be able to stay at home,” Miller said. “For others, we do have university apartments that are available for students that for one reason or another cannot be accommodated in the residence hall. Other than that, we’ll be referring them to apartments in the community.”
At EMCC, seats in classrooms will be spread out with a focus on social distancing.
“Our classrooms may look a little different,” EMCC President Scott Alsobrooks said at a Clay County Board of Supervisors meeting last week.
EMCC will ensure every classroom will be equipped with a camera this fall, giving classes the opportunity to livestream their lectures for students that don’t feel safe attending in-person.
EMCC’s Mayhew campus does not have student housing, so all students will live off campus.
Hodge is the former sports editor for The Dispatch.
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