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Spring semester to start online, gradually move to in-person

Serena Bettis

December 19, 2020

Colorado State University students will start their spring semester just as the last one ended, with all classes held online for at least one week.

President Joyce McConnell made the announcement in a Dec. 17 email and explained that the University wants to test all students before scheduling in-person learning due to public health officials’ predictions that the COVID-19 pandemic will peak in January.

“Our goal is for all students to walk into our classrooms, labs or other learning spaces only after having gotten a negative COVID-19 test from the CSU testing site,” the message reads.

Starting Jan. 25, courses scheduled for face-to-face instruction will transition to in-person, permitting any restrictions from the Larimer County Department of Health and Environment. McConnell’s message said the first courses to transfer will include courses for first years and seniors, studio courses, labs and more.

“Over the next few weeks and into January, the Pandemic Preparedness Team and the Teaching and Learning Recovery Team will work with college and departmental leadership to monitor the county, state and national conditions to ascertain the best plan for all course offerings at all levels,” the message said.

Courses currently scheduled for the hybrid format will receive an update Feb. 5 on whether or not they will add in-person instruction or remain fully online. In the message, McConnell said they do not want to set exact dates for this shift because the status of the pandemic in the spring could easily change.

Despite the change to remote learning at the beginning of the semester, spring break will remain April 12-16 and the final weeks of the semester will be fully online as the fall semester was. Additionally, residence halls will open as scheduled Jan. 14 with mandatory COVID-19 testing for students prior to their move in.

For more details, students can refer to the FAQ from McConnell’s message, view updates from Housing & Dining Services and look up times to get tested on campus.

“I want to say thank you again for all that you have done and for all that you will do in staying resilient, positive and committed to our community this spring,” McConnell said in a video message. “We truly couldn’t do this without you, and I am so very grateful for you all.”

Serena Bettis can be reached at news@collegian.com or on Twitter @serenaroseb.

About the Contributor

Serena Bettis, Editor in Chief

Serena Bettis is your 2022-23 editor in chief and is in her final year studying journalism and political science. In her three years at The Collegian, Bettis has also been a news reporter, copy editor, news editor and content managing editor, and she occasionally takes photos, too. When Bettis was 5, her family moved from Iowa to a tiny town northwest of Fort Collins called Livermore, Colorado, before eventually moving to Fort Collins proper. When she was 8 years old, her dad enrolled at Colorado State University as a nontraditional student veteran, where he found his life's passion in photojournalism. Although Bettis' own passion for journalism did not stem directly from her dad, his time at CSU and with The Collegian gave her the motivation to bite down on her fear of talking to strangers and find The Collegian newsroom on the second day of classes in 2019. She's never looked back since. Considering that aforementioned fear, Bettis is constantly surprised to be where she is today. However, thanks to the supportive learning environment at The Collegian and inspiring peers, Bettis has not stopped chasing her teenage dream of being a professional journalist. Between working with her section editors, coordinating news stories between Rocky Mountain Student Media departments and coaching new reporters, Bettis gets to live that dream every day. When she's not in the newsroom or almost falling asleep in class, you can find Bettis working in the Durrell Marketplace and Café or outside gazing at the beauty that is our campus (and running inside when bees are nearby). This year, Bettis' goals for The Collegian include continuing its trajectory as a unique alt-weekly newspaper, documenting the institutional memory of the paper to benefit students in years to come and fostering a sense of community and growth both inside the newsroom and through The Collegian's published work. Bettis would like to encourage anyone with story ideas, suggestions, questions, concerns or comments to reach out to her at editor@collegian.com.

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