COSAM News Articles 2020 June Message from Dean Giordano - June 16, 2020

Message from Dean Giordano - June 16, 2020

Published: 06/16/2020

Planning continues as we prepare to welcome students for the start of the Fall semester in August. While a number of details are not yet finalized and will probably be announced by the President and Provost soon, here are some general thoughts on what these plans will look like. Many aspects of the Auburn reopening plan will likely be similar to what we are all hearing from other universities.

There will likely be a smartphone app that students will use to report their health status (daily temperature and much more) and that will collect data that will be essential for contact tracing if that should be necessary.
Most and perhaps all classrooms, offices, and hallways, etc., will be marked to aid everyone in respecting social distancing in all spaces on campus.
The details of a campus-wide policy on the wearing of masks are now being worked out. All students, faculty, and staff should plan on providing their own masks. All offices in COSAM will have spare masks available if a visitor or student forgets their mask. Likewise, we plan to hand sanitizer available in all offices.
Effective June 29 through at least August 8, visitors will be welcome on campus and meetings will be allowed. However, there will still be restrictions on meeting size and a requirement for folks to wear masks and keep social distancing in mind. All such meetings will also need explicit permission as explained in the President’s recent message (https://ocm.auburn.edu/news/coronavirus/updates/20200611-event-guidelines.php?ref=coronavirus).

I know that many of you are anxious about what things will look like in the Fall. I want to reassure you that enormous efforts are now underway to make sure that Auburn will safe for all of us as the campus reopens.

If you have questions I encourage you to join me on Zoom during my open office hours each week at 2:00-3:30pm on Wednesday ( https://auburn.zoom.us/j/97424981354) and 9:00-10:30am on Thursday (https://auburn.zoom.us/j/92115126214).