The moment the COVID-19 pandemic struck, schools, universities and all academic institutions alike had to start gearing up to its potential implications. The utmost priority has always been prioritizing a safe learning environment, whether that be in the K-12 school in Chicago or our campus here at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.

The mask mandate at the University came into effect shortly after CDC guidelines were made clear, in 2020. Since then, we have continued to abide by the rules laid out by the CDC. This in mind, the University shall be lifting the mask mandate starting Monday, 28th February 2022. While this will be put into effect campus-wide in credence with the Champaign-Urbana area mandate, I believe that it will be smart to do this in an incremental manner. We will continue to require students, instructors and building staff alike to be fully masked within classrooms and a select few other indoor facilities.

The Student Affairs department at the University has determined that approximately 77 percent of all primary, on-campus, activities are carried out in university buildings. This includes instructional facilities, along with research laboratories, libraries and so on. Our classrooms and most of the academic buildings are being utilized in full effect, at about 67 percent capacity. We want to encourage safety protocols campus-wide, but especially indoors for this reason. With the rise of the Omicron variant toward the end of last year, 2021, the administration re-evaluated the steps we were willing to take for student safety but also accommodate our business as per usual attitude.

As always, we want to put our best foot forward. It is our understanding that remaining fully operational, as much as possible, has benefitted the student experience and overall satisfaction level on campus. In hopes to accommodate a everyone’s needs, to ensure goodwill and mutual satisfaction, our COVID-19 protocols will continue to be fluid and flexible. For this reason, the University has attempted to provide an array of options for classes to be online, a hybrid or in person.

At this point it is also important to address the concerns some student groups have expressed regarding the virtual versus in-person format. Our administration is aware that in recent times, specifically, the Graduate Employees Organization voiced their concerns regarding our return to the in-person format starting this Spring 2022. As a collective shifting to this format was a joint decision, however this does not take away from our seriousness towards the variant. As of now 95 percept of the campus population is fully vaccinated. As this number continues to increase and building access is granted purely depending on this, we believe we can slowly push for the booster shot to become a requirement too.

Other concerns taken into consideration for the continued masking within classrooms policy was the impending Spring break around the corner. We know that the University cannot control students’ activity outside the classroom but throughout this entire pandemic we implore everyone exercise caution. We know we have students from all over the state, Chicago, surrounding suburbs, as well as out of state students to consider. Although certain campus celebrations and the travel involved in this coming break may warrant a plausible spike in the number of cases. We are confident in our regular, state of the art testing facilities will help us maintain homeostasis with regards to our numbers.

The Champaign-Urbana community is a college town. There are many community members who, our faculty and staff included, who aren’t young twenty-year-old’s. As always, we respect our wonderful family of C-U and campus town residents alike.

On a more personal note, the Jones family, ourselves have been reflecting on our Spring break plans this year. The frustrations and difficulties regarding these troubling times, while not the same for everyone, are completely understandable. The Omicron variant has demanded a level of due diligence from all community members. Going back to the classroom mask mandate, we want our classes to be a source of solely higher learning and a memorable college experience, nothing else. Now more than ever is the time for us to work together and move forward with a positive attitude, as opposed to a positive test result.