Dear Orediggers,
If you are watching the news these days, you have seen the stories about how COVID-19 is impacting colleges and universities here in Colorado and across the nation. Some have moved back to full remote delivery, or have closed their campuses, or have had to issue a temporary university-wide quarantine.
Like us, they had plans incorporating the latest health guidance, they had testing programs, they had contingency plans, and they had new expectations for community behavior – like our Oredigger Promise.
What they didn’t have was you.
Because of your choices and everyday decisions since mid-August, in-person classes continue to be held and our campus facilities continue to be open.
Because of your sacrifices, on-campus residents – including our first-year students – continue to live in our residence halls, apartments and sorority and fraternity houses.
Because you are wearing masks, staying socially distanced, washing your hands, and avoiding large gatherings, we are even beginning to assess the possibility of staging an in-person December Commencement on campus (more on that later) and we are exploring ways to offer an increased percentage of in-person courses in the spring.
These are not things that are happening on every college campus. That they are happening here is due to you.
Thank you – for following the Oredigger Promise and for making individual personal sacrifices on behalf of our community.
And a special thanks to those students who have isolated and quarantined as needed. To the students of Pi Beta Phi, Randall Hall Second Floor and Sigma Alpha Epsilon, thank you for successfully completing your quarantines. To the students who are in quarantine right now on Elm Hall Fifth Floor and the suite in Weaver Towers, thank you and hang in there. Your sacrifices are not going unnoticed—or unappreciated.
While you’ve each done so much, we cannot let up now. We still have a long road ahead of us to achieve our collective goal of staying together through final exams in December. We all need to stay vigilant, and I hope you agree with me that being together at Mines is worth it. It is.
Stay well – Go Orediggers!
PCJ
Paul C. Johnson
President and Professor
Colorado School of Mines