To the Campus Community,
Last month Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker announced the state’s lifting of the remaining COVID-19 restrictions. After careful evaluation of the CDC and Governor’s recent guidelines, the steady decline of infection rates, and the increasing vaccination rates, we are once again ready to update our on-campus policies.
Effective immediately:
- Outdoor face covering mandate has been lifted.
- Vaccinated individuals are now exempt from surveillance testing.
- We updated our travel policy to provide more flexibility, especially for vaccinated individuals.
For now, we will keep in place all other safety protocols, including:
- Face coverings are required INSIDE campus buildings at all times.
- Social distancing of 6 ft is still required indoors and outdoors on campus.
- Individuals should continue to practice good hygiene and regular hard washing.
- Our rigorous cleaning efforts will remain in place.
- We will continue to follow recommended standards for maintaining indoor air quality.
- We will continue surveillance testing of non-vaccinated individual who are frequently on campus (weekly or more).
In order to preserve a safe workplace in the midst of rapid change, we believe some more time needs to pass for the local community to get fully vaccinated before we further loosen our on-campus policies. In addition, we need to have more specific information about the vaccination status of all those working and studying on our campus. To that end, we continue to strongly recommend that all members of the campus community get vaccinated.
- Faculty and Staff are strongly encouraged to voluntarily self-report their vaccination status, and upload vaccination documentation here.
- Students who are coming to campus, or physically accessing campus resources for the fall semester, and wish to live, learn and/or conduct research on campus, are required to get vaccinated and submit documentation, on the basis of expected additional state, federal, and legal guidance and vaccine availability.
- If you would like to get vaccinated at University Health Services, click here to schedule an appointment.
As always, the health and safety of our entire community continues to be our number one priority. These decisions are based on a rigorous evaluation of health conditions, federal and state public health authority guidance, statistics surrounding the COVID-19 virus, and vaccination rates.
If you have any questions or concerns related to returning to campus, please email us at: returntocampus@umb.edu
Stay safe; stay strong. Go Beacons!
Garrett Smith
Deputy Chancellor
