All faculty and staff must follow the COVID-19 safety protocols and requirements issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), L.A. County Department of Public Health and other health authorities.
Category: Faculty
Today, the Pac-12 presidents and chancellors unanimously voted to postpone athletic competitions until the end of the calendar year.
The California Department of Public Health released its Guidance for Institutions of Higher Education on Aug. 7, 2020. USC is currently reviewing and analyzing this guidance and will collaborate with the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health and other authorities to determine its impact on our plans to repopulate our campuses.
Charles Zukoski, Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs, shares guidelines for asynchronous learning for the Fall 2020 semester.
We do not yet have clearance from the state or county to move forward with classroom instruction. Given the delay in receiving the required permission, we have made the difficult decision to begin the fall semester with fully remote instruction with limited exceptions for clinical education.
USC Student Health is initiating population testing (“Pop. Testing”) of COVID-19 with the external company, Color, to begin the week of Aug. 3, 2020. The ongoing testing is part of the university’s overall testing strategy to identify, isolate, contact trace and contain new infections.
Employees and supervisors should review the details about USC’s screening, symptom and exposure reporting process for employees who are working onsite.
We recently received information about a confirmed case of COVID-19 from an Auxiliary Services employee who worked in the central kitchen area for McKay’s and Rosso’s. The last dates the individual worked shifts were July 13 and 14. Employees with possible exposure were contacted and received instructions for self-monitoring. Patrons, who based on our records, visited Rosso’s on July 13 and 14 are being notified.
In the summer, our on-premise and near-premise campus population is much smaller than during the fall and spring semesters. However, we are seeing some worrisome trends emerge from this smaller population that our community should take into consideration. Over the last two weeks, the COVID-19 test positivity rate increased from 5% to 9% among students.
We were very pleased to learn that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security agreed to rescind its July 6 guidance. This would have, among other things, required our international students to take in-person classes in order to maintain their visa status.