Dear GGU Community,
Our overarching principle throughout the ongoing coronavirus (COVID-19 ) situation has been one of striving to maintain our educational mission and campus operations while also preserving the health and safety of community members.
As I announced last week, GGU decided to move all our non-law classes online, effective yesterday, to help limit coronavirus risk on campus. The law school will follow suit on Thursday.
As of today, the university itself remains open and operational. However, the libraries will close Thursday because of the absence of students on campus. Library services will remain available to students online as indicated on the Student FAQ page.
While we remain an open campus, we are also prepared—where possible—to support staff members who would like to engage in social distancing practices by working off-site. This includes, but is not limited to, employees who may be more vulnerable to the effects of COVID-19 because of age or underlying health issues, or who need to remain home for other reasons related to the coronavirus situation. We encourage staff members to seek approval from their managers to explore work solutions that can accommodate their concerns or personal needs and maintain continuity of services. In some instances, work functions must be performed on campus, and requests for telecommuting will need to consider this. If you have questions, please speak with your manager or GGU HR (hr@ggu.edu).
For hourly employees who prefer to work remotely, they can do so with manager approval. If the manager does not approve remote work, the hourly employee can either work on campus or decide not to work and not be paid for those unworked hours.
The university has a very limited supply of extra technology equipment that can be used off-site. Thus, with very few exceptions, the university will not be able to provide additional equipment to support working from home for staff who prefer to do so. (Staff who are not using already assigned GGU equipment, e.g., laptops and mobile devices, are encouraged to return them to ITS for redeployment to others for off-site work). The university cannot allow workstations (desktop computers, monitors, etc.) to be relocated off-site, where they will not function properly. The university is also not in a position to reimburse employees for their use of personal equipment, or phone and internet connection services. However, our ITS support staff will strive to provide technical support (assistance with forwarding phones, enabling VPN, etc.) where possible for staff who prefer to work remotely.
As a reminder, for employees working with physical student records, those must remain on campus in secure storage following FERPA guidelines.
We are also encouraging units to make use of existing technologies including Zoom video conferencing and Microsoft Teams to facilitate collaboration when staff members are in different locations. ITS is prepared to provide support for this.
As always, the health and safety of our community is paramount. Employees who have a fever, cough, or flu-like symptoms must stay home. Doctors advise that you follow the same treatment as you would if you had the flu, including calling a doctor if symptoms become severe. Employees who believe they have been in contact with someone infected with COVID-19—and feel sick with a fever, cough, or difficulty breathing within 14 days—must also stay home and should definitely call their doctor’s office, urgent care clinic, or emergency department ahead of time and tell them about the situation.
Best practices on how to protect yourself from infection are available on the Centers for Disease Control web site. Updates on the university’s response to this will be posted here.
Some of the steps the university has taken to ensure the safety of our employees include:
- We have extended the extra disinfecting cleaning regime that we started two weeks ago. This will continue through at least this week.
- We are upgrading the air filters in our HVAC system to be more robust.
- We are cancelling rental client events that would bring non-GGU people to our campus facility.
- We added a link to our COVID-19 FAQ page to the home page of the GGU website.
- We participated in a COVID-19 workshop hosted by the SF Department of Emergency Management for Bay Area colleges and universities, and we are monitoring their ongoing response and sharing advice on best practices.
- We remain in contact with and receive multiple daily updates from the San Francisco Department of Public Health and the Department of Emergency Management.
These are extraordinary times. As always, we will continue to monitor the evolution of the coronavirus outbreak and couple our best judgement with the guidance of outside professionals to determine appropriate responses.
If you have questions or concerns, do not hesitate to reach out to your manager.
Regards,
Dr. David Fike
President, Golden Gate University