March 18,2020
Dear Santa Clara University Community,
We are so grateful to all of you for pulling together as a community to support each other and our students during these unprecedented and challenging times. I am continually inspired by your willingness to help, your creative ideas, and your unwavering commitment to our students.
Through your collective efforts, we have been able to swiftly initiate a temporary shift to virtual and remote instruction in response to the rapidly changing circumstances surrounding the Covid-19 pandemic. On March 16, the President’s Update on COVID-19 announced that virtual learning and exams will be extended through the end of the academic year. I want to provide some clarity on what this decision means for our academic programs and operations.
First, I need to highlight a safety issue. We ask everyone to stay away from campus – eliminating our presence not only helps to prevent spread, it also allows for those personnel who must remain on campus to focus on the most essential activities. Essential services includes work done by some employees in facilities, security, safety, IT, housing, dining services and personnel whose work is necessary to ensure the ongoing viability of research such as maintaining living organisms and conducting critical maintenance procedures. Activities necessary to support our transition to online learning are also considered essential during the Shelter In Place order, but please work remotely as much as possible.
Second, we have updated the Faculty FAQ to include detailed information about the undergraduate and graduate spring term schedules, which we briefly summarize below. We know that you are inundated with constant communications about this global health emergency. We strongly urge you to read the entire FAQ as it provides important information about courses and labs.
At the graduate level, spring term start and end dates will vary by School. At the undergraduate level, this will not impact the spring quarter start and end dates (March 30 - June 5) and the final exam period (June 8 - June 11). We have designated the period from March 30 - April 7 as Instructional Preparation time for faculty and students so that we can be successful when classes resume fully online on April 8th for undergraduates, so that both faculty and students can succeed in the temporary conversion of our high-quality, personalized, whole-person Jesuit tradition to a virtual format.
For faculty beginning online instruction on April 8, this time has been set aside to prepare for online instructional delivery. Each dean will work with her respective unit and department chairs to set expectations for the instructional preparation period. Faculty are expected to prepare and communicate some information about course expectations and provide students with at least one meaningful preparatory activity (e.g., a reading assignment or video) in advance of April 8 to the extent possible to guide students in this new environment.
Depending on the course, students will be asked to use the period between March 30 and April 7 to engage in educational activities such as reviewing course expectations, reading assigned texts, completing assigned work, working on problem sets, watching videos, setting up their technology, and preparing other necessary supplies. Students will need to regularly monitor communications from their professors.
With support from our excellent Collaborative for Teaching Innovation team of faculty and staff, our dedicated faculty will work on adapting, recording, and uploading course content for effective and innovative online delivery. They have already identified and curated great resources available for online learning across all disciplines. Courses and labs can be reimagined in ways that allow us to offer them remotely. Throughout this transition to remote instruction, we will continuously provide support and resources to ensure that faculty and students can prepare and adapt to the new instructional modalities.
These days are not easy for faculty, staff or students and we will miss being with each other on campus. We must do this, however, to keep everyone in our community safer. As an academic enterprise, we must also ensure that we can deliver on our educational commitments to our students, providing them with a transformational experience – steeped in our Jesuit mission and practices – and prepare them for the next stage of their educational and professional careers.
Thanks for all that you are doing to stay calm and focused during this very strange time. You and your families will remain in my thoughts and prayers.
Take care,
Lisa Kloppenberg Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs
We will continue to provide additional updates and information as the Covid-19 pandemic situation evolves. Please consult our COVID-19 website for regular updates. Please continue to email covid19@scu.edu if you have additional questions and concerns.