{"id":149507,"date":"2021-10-11T09:07:32","date_gmt":"2021-10-11T19:07:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=149507"},"modified":"2021-10-11T11:57:22","modified_gmt":"2021-10-11T21:57:22","slug":"plan-for-return-to-campus-spring-2022","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2021\/10\/11\/plan-for-return-to-campus-spring-2022\/","title":{"rendered":"UH<\/abbr> President: Please plan now for return to campus in the spring"},"content":{"rendered":"Reading time: <\/span> 3<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>

This message was shared with the faculty and staff of the 10-campus University of Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> system on October 11, 2021.<\/em><\/p>\n

Aloha to our entire UH<\/abbr> faculty and staff!<\/p>\n

At this point we are asking all chairs and faculty to carefully review your spring 2022 schedules and make adjustments to the mode of instruction to provide our students across the UH<\/abbr> System with the on-campus educational experience they need and expect.<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As I\u02bbm sure you are observing, our COVID-19 case numbers and the availability of health care capacity are now trending in the right direction. Our vaccination rates as a state continue to exceed national averages. The modeling work of our faculty inspires optimism. And with COVID-19 vaccine now fully authorized by the FDA<\/abbr>, our UH<\/abbr> vaccination requirement will be fully implemented beginning in January.<\/p>\n

The safety measures we put into place have been highly effective. While we have much more activity on our campuses this year than last, our campus case counts have remained low even as the numbers in our communities skyrocketed. We know of no cases of COVID-19 transmission on a UH<\/abbr> campus this year.<\/p>\n

You were amazing in your shift to remote teaching when the pandemic hit us in spring 2020. Our students could not have continued on track without your commitment and dedication. And now it\u02bbs time to look ahead.<\/p>\n

Our UH<\/abbr> Health and Well-being Working Group composed of our expert faculty, staff and student membership recommends our return to campuses as both safe and essential to psychological well-being. We thank all of you who have already led the shift of much of our spring instructional schedule back to campus. We know that many of our students have struggled with the loss of face-to-face contact, especially many of those who need us most.<\/p>\n

Our students’ success depends in part on our commitment to teach and support them in-person as well as online. On a number of our campuses, retention of students dropped notably, including when the Delta surge prevented us from returning to as much in-person instruction and support this fall as we had planned.<\/p>\n

So at this point we are asking all chairs and faculty to carefully review your spring 2022 schedules and make adjustments to the mode of instruction to provide our students across the UH<\/abbr> System with the on-campus educational experience they need and expect.<\/p>\n

We will return to full utilization of our classrooms per CDC<\/abbr> guidelines<\/a> and we are confident this will be a safe transition. Provisions for safety will include:<\/p>\n