Message to Staff from the Senior Vice-Principal - Monday 09 March 2020
Dear colleague,
Further to my message to staff on Friday - and with the number of confirmed cases of Covid-19 in the UK now standing at 319, with 23 cases in Scotland - I wanted to reiterate the steps that the University is taking around contingency planning.
While we are still following national guidance, the situation is fast developing, and we are doing all we can to be ready for all potential scenarios.
The Ministry of Education & Higher Education in Qatar has taken the decision that all schools and universities in Qatar must close from tomorrow. Staff can continue to operate on the Qatar campus and an academic group is ensuring that the online collaborate sessions through MyAberdeen will allow Qatar students to continue their studies in Qatar off campus.
Our Aberdeen campuses are currently not in that position, but if advice in Scotland and the UK were to change, we need to prepare for that possibility. This includes planning for teaching to be delivered in a different format, if activity had to be reduced on our campuses here.
If this were to happen, all steps would be put in place to ensure minimum disruption for our students, including ensuring academic progression and completion of study.
Planning is being conducted by the smaller sub-groups who are reporting into the University’s Coronavirus Steering Group. I can provide this update from the Learning and Teaching Group:
- Schools have been developing their own contingency plans and have today been asked to take forward those plans. Support sessions have been run for Schools to assist with the development of alternative teaching and alternative assessments – IF these are needed.
- Professor Ruth Taylor (Vice-Principal Education) and Gillian Mackintosh (Director of Academic Services and Online Education) will be meeting with all Schools over the next few days to support the work and will identify where further development is required.
All staff should now have Microsoft Teams* – which enables internal and remote communications - on your desktops. Please familiarise yourself with this software.
And finally, please keep checking in with our Coronavirus pages as our latest updates and advice are being posted there, including a new FAQ section for staff with HR queries.
Best wishes
Karl
Professor Karl Leydecker
Chair of the Coronavirus Steering Group
Senior Vice-Principal
*Teams enables collaboration - allowing chats, online meetings and team work. You’ll find guidance on how to use Teams in the University Toolkit’s MS Teams resource. Please contact the Service Desk if you experience any problems servicedesk@abdn.ac.uk.
As with any University IT system, communications and information in Teams are official records, and you should follow the University’s IT Conditions of Use at all times