UNC-Chapel Hill will start spring semester later, drop spring break. Here’s the plan.
UNC-Chapel Hill will delay the start of the spring semester and eliminate a traditional spring break as it hopes to bring students back to campus in the new year amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Classes will start almost two weeks later than normal, on Jan. 19, UNC Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz announced to the campus Thursday afternoon. He said this would provide “the maximum time between winter break and the start of classes.”
Spring commencement will be pushed back a week, to Sunday, May 16. Winter commencement will be postponed. UNC hopes to have a combined ceremony for spring 2020, winter 2020 and spring 2021 graduates.
There won’t be a week of spring break, as in most years. Instead, Guskiewicz said there will be five “wellness days” throughout the semester.
“We have heard from many of you that we need to provide more breaks during the semester, so we will incorporate five days either individually or in combined clusters for that purpose,” the chancellor said. “In addition, the schools and deans will make clear that these wellness days are intended as breaks from the semester — not for studying — so faculty will be instructed to avoid scheduling exams, quizzes and other major assignments on days following these breaks. The dates for the wellness days will be updated on the Registrar’s website soon.”
Sophomore Lamar Richards said he is concerned about having scattered days off. Having one day off in the middle of the week is not giving students a mental break, because students will still have to study or prepare for the next day’s assignments, he said.
“What it would require for students to have a restful and restorative mental break is a sufficient amount of days off,” Richards said.
He serves on UNC’s Campus & Community Advisory Committee, which was tasked with making recommendations to the chancellor about spring plans. He said students in that group made it clear that a full spring break was preferred and that students needed at least two consecutive days off.
Without a week-long break, Richards suggested making a Thursday and Friday the days off for an extended weekend that would not interfere as much with class schedules.
East Carolina University also announced a later start date and no spring break next semester. Both ECU and N.C. State University are planning for in-person classes this spring and more students living in dorms with single rooms.
UNC, ECU and NCSU each moved all classes online and closed dorms this fall as COVID-19 cases spiked. Appalachian State University is facing similar problems with cases rising and nearly 20 coronavirus clusters reported on campus. App State has yet to pivot the fall semester and has not announced plans for the spring semester.
Limiting travel in the spring
Guskiewicz said in his letter that eliminating the traditional spring break is an “effort to limit any potential spread of the virus caused by travel during an extended break.”
Some faculty, staff and community leaders on the Campus & Community Advisory Committee also expressed concern about students traveling to places like Panama City Beach, Florida, and Mexico for vacation.
Richards and Student Body President Reeves Moseley said students will take their own spring break, whether the university has a sanctioned break or not. Richards noted that many students still traveled over Labor Day weekend, even though it was not a university holiday.
“I am unequivocally sure that students are going to have their own spring breaks anyway if the majority of our community is interacting with the university in a virtual way and not on campus,” Richards said in an interview with the News & Observer.
After the news came out Thursday, UNC senior Ruth Samuel said on Twitter she plans to take her own time off. “UNC said no Spring Break? Lol, I’ll be blocking a week off regardless. Be blessed,” she tweeted.
Potential travel and student behavior make it even more important to have mandatory testing for students and anyone who is coming onto campus or interacting with UNC, Richards said.
At a meeting of the committee Tuesday, Moseley also suggested COVID-19 testing following a multi-day break and having students quarantine and have remote classes for a week or two weeks after that break.
The entire committee agreed that mandatory and regular testing is necessary in the spring.
What will UNC campus housing look like?
The university has not announced plans about in-person classes or how residence halls will be set up this spring, but some students will be living in dorms.
About 1,500 are currently living on campus, including athletes, international students and others who applied for exceptions.
Carolina Housing Executive Director Allan Blattner said UNC will only offer single rooms this spring. If students opt to live in a dorm, they will not be charged for a single room. Campus apartments will be at the normal rate, he said.
With single rooms, the university has space for up to 3,900 students to live on campus.
Blattner said the number of students that will be invited back will depend on public health guidance and whether courses will be face-to-face, completely online or a mix of the two.
The university is still determining how spring classes will be taught, with recommendations and guidance from the Campus & Community Advisory Committee, other UNC faculty, staff, infectious disease experts and public health officials.
UNC will make decisions in the coming weeks about campus-wide COVID-19 surveillance testing, expanded contact tracing, campus housing and plans for isolation and quarantine space, deadlines for spring registration and rules for on-campus and off-campus activities.
This story was originally published October 8, 2020 at 4:23 PM with the headline "UNC-Chapel Hill will start spring semester later, drop spring break. Here’s the plan.."
