From the Dean: COVID-19 updates

Dear staff and faculty,

I hope each of you is some place safe and that you and your loved ones are well. This is an uncertain time for all of us, so I wanted to reach out with a few updates. Let me begin by offering my deepest appreciation for what each of you has done to date and will continue to do to ensure our students have meaningful learning opportunities and the research, outreach, and business functions of our College are able to continue in some fashion during these challenging times. I know that much has been asked of our community, and I am proud of the way our College has responded.

We have long led the University in online learning, so we are well-equipped to move to fully online instruction on March 30. Please connect with your more experienced peers and with our Innovation in Teaching and Technology team for support and ideas. Please remember to check in with our part-time faculty and graduate teaching assistants to see if they could use support.

Special thanks go to our staff members who are working quietly but frantically, largely behind the scenes, to ensure that everyone has access to the technology they need to work remotely, that our business processes continue uninterrupted, that our buildings are safe and secure, that attendees are notified of canceled events and issued refunds, and that our communication channels are open, among many other tasks.

Things are changing quickly, we are getting new information daily, and not everyone is getting the same communication. Here is what we know as of today:

Students: Please reach out to your students—graduate and undergraduate—on a regular basis to check in on them, see if they need support, and find out what issues they are having with access to course materials. All students have received an email from me with links to resources, but they will appreciate hearing from faculty they know and trust. If you encounter students with issues that you do not know how to address, please send a description of the need/concern and the student’s contact information to coedean@uga.edu, and I will get it directed to the most appropriate place. Please be lenient and generous with your students as they, too, are experiencing stress from uncertainty and may be caring for family members, have uncertain living conditions, or may be facing financial difficulties.

All students received a notice from University Housing on Wednesday about vacating their housing, and this message created a lot of angst for graduate students, in particular. The University understands that graduate housing is the primary and often only residence for graduate students. These students simply need to complete the form stating that they need to remain in University Housing so campus police know which units are occupied and can conduct appropriate security checks. Please reassure students that the University is working hard to meet their needs, and encourage them to bring concerns to you, which you can then forward to your unit head, an associate dean, or me to address.

Academics: We are working diligently on getting answers from certifying and licensing agencies about how best to help our students meet requirements so they can graduate on time and be employed. As we receive guidance, we are passing it on to department heads and program coordinators. We have asked program coordinators to forward those communications to all of the faculty in their programs to facilitate the sharing of consistent and timely information.

Advisement for undergraduates continues through conferencing software. The Graduate School has issued guidance about oral and written comprehensive examinations and thesis/dissertation defenses and the use of conferencing software to facilitate these meetings; please check with your graduate coordinator for details.

Although all campus library facilities are closed to walk-in traffic, librarians are available to assist you with both instruction and research. There is a guide on the main page explaining services available, and there are request forms for you and students to use if you need hard copy materials scanned and emailed to you.

Research: As on-campus research winds down as of Friday, we are making every effort to ensure that graduate assistants and research staff have continuous work to do off-site (e.g., data analysis, literature reviews, manuscript development). We and OVPR are monitoring funding agency policies and will do everything in our power to ensure these individuals are paid. Please check the OVPR FAQ page regularly.

Payroll: Payroll is scheduled to run as planned on March 31. Federal work study students have been guaranteed access to their hourly salary while the University has suspended in-person classes.

Building access: Ramsey is accessible only by card swipe, and Aderhold and River’s Crossing are open 7 a.m.-5:30 p.m. and via card swipe otherwise. I anticipate that our buildings will be open for fewer hours in the future as fewer people are on campus, but we will post updates in COEfyi.

Please continue to monitor your UGA email and the University’s COVID-19 page for the latest information.

Again, thank you for everything you are doing to maintain continuity of our operations while working remotely and caring for your families. Following Mary Frances Early’s example of persistence and determination, we will get through this together.

Stay safe,
Denise A. Spangler
Dean

Contact information for technology needs:

Please contact ITT for eLC and online teaching questions:

  • Nic Holt, ITT director
  • Jeff Rieter for questions about web conferencing, Zoom, audio recording, eLC issues, and online assessments
  • Kayla Pritchard for questions about social media in general, eLC issues, and online assessments
  • Ron Braxley for questions about video capture and captioning

Please contact OIT for technical/equipment questions:

Any questions other than those listed above can be directed to the OIT help desk via email or via phone at 706-542-8007.

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