November Updates
November 8, 2021
Dear students, staff, and faculty,
I want to begin by congratulating the extraordinary Brooklyn College Women’s Volleyball Team that won the 2021 CUNY Athletic Conference Championship against Hunter College in the title match Friday night. I am grateful that we have a strong athletic program in which our scholar-athletes can excel.
I hope you are doing well during this busy time of the semester. It’s been a while since I’ve written, and I am pleased to do so now to share relevant updates on campus safety and registration for the spring semester.
Safety Measures
We continue to work hard to protect everyone on campus from COVID-19. Pursuant to the CUNY vaccination mandate, students on campus are now vaccinated. The large majority of our faculty and staff are vaccinated as well, and those who remain unvaccinated continue to be subject to weekly COVID testing. When we discover that someone who is positive with the virus has been on campus, we follow strict contact tracing protocols to identify and inform every person who needs to quarantine as a result. We also abide by a universal masking mandate. Together, these measures have been very effective at ensuring campus safety.
Vaccinated Students on Campus
The CUNY vaccination mandate requires students on campus to be fully vaccinated, which means two shots of Pfizer or Moderna or one shot of Johnson & Johnson, plus 14 days thereafter. Unvaccinated students who have not been granted a medical or religious exemption may not enter the campus. Their past ability to obtain COVID testing to gain entry has been removed. As a result, except for those few students who have been granted religious or medical exemptions, all students on campus now are fully vaccinated.
Students Taking In-Person Classes
Students must be fully vaccinated not only to enter campus, but also to remain enrolled in their in-person classes. We carefully reviewed the list of students taking in-person classes who have not been verified as fully vaccinated. We reached out to each one of these students repeatedly and individually to ensure that our records were accurate, and that they had the opportunity to upload their records if they had been vaccinated. Once we winnowed the list carefully, we issued WA grades to 70 students to withdraw them from their in-person classes. We also informed each student of the mechanism by which, if they become fully vaccinated, they may reverse a WA grade.
Students Taking Hybrid Classes
Students must also be fully vaccinated to remain enrolled in their hybrid classes this semester. Any student in a hybrid class that plans to meet on campus later this semester must be vaccinated, no matter what professors or others may have said. We have informed every unvaccinated student enrolled in a hybrid course at risk of withdrawal that they must upload a copy of their COVID vaccination card into CUNYfirst at least 10 days prior to the next session of their hybrid class on campus. If they fail to do so, they will be withdrawn from the hybrid class. Faculty in hybrid courses may not circumvent the vaccination mandate by making individual arrangements with unvaccinated students.
Winter Semester
Registration for the winter intersession is open now. You can earn three credits in just three weeks in January. The winter provides students with a great opportunity to make up for lost time and get ahead in the classes they need to graduate. Register now!
Spring Semester
We are looking forward to the spring. Registration opens Nov. 15. It is important to register early to get the classes you need for progress toward your degree. In the spring, 70% of our classes will be on campus and 30% will be online or hybrid. Students who have not yet done so must upload their COVID vaccination cards into CUNYfirst by Jan. 18, which is ten days before spring classes begin.
Supporting Students with Federal Stimulus Funds
Additional federal stimulus funding is coming soon for many of our students, and they can apply it directly to tuition and fee balances. We hope that this additional funding will provide our students with some financial relief during this challenging time.
As you all know, November is when the academic work of the fall semester peaks. It can be stressful and take a toll on our health. If you feel ill or come down with symptoms of anything—from the common cold to COVID—please do not come to campus. Let your professor or supervisor know that you don’t feel well and rest. As we fly through the work in front of us, please don’t forget to take care of yourself and your loved ones. I am rooting for all of us to come through this month healthy and ready for finals and the break thereafter.
I want to close with a beautiful story about our Feirstein Graduate School of Cinema, which was featured recently in a segment on WABC-TV. Take a look and share in our great pride for this amazing film school that works to diversify the voices in Hollywood and the stories they tell.
Yours truly,
Michelle J. Anderson
President, Brooklyn College
