{"id":2006,"date":"2020-05-29T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-05-29T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/blogtest\/may-29-update-from-president-mcphee-on-covid-19-strategic-task-force-report\/"},"modified":"2026-04-15T15:25:27","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T20:25:27","slug":"may-29-update-from-president-mcphee-on-covid-19-strategic-task-force-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/may-29-update-from-president-mcphee-on-covid-19-strategic-task-force-report\/","title":{"rendered":"MAY 29: Update from President McPhee on COVID-19 Strategic Task Force Report"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 20px;\" class=\"sharethis-inline-share-buttons\" ><\/div><p>To the University community,<\/p>\n<p>I am pleased to share with you the report of the COVID-19 Strategic Task Force chaired by Provost Byrnes.\u00a0 As you know, I charged the Task Force to provide recommendations to me for our return to on-campus operations.\u00a0 Please find for your review the full report: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/covidtaskforce\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">www.mtsu.edu\/covidtaskforce<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>In summary, some of the key recommendations include:\u00a0<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Campus will be open this Fall, but with social distancing measures in effect;<\/li>\n<li>A variety of class formats will be used: on-ground, online and hybrid;<\/li>\n<li>Our goal will be to reduce the density of people in classrooms;<\/li>\n<li>\u201cHands on\u201d courses will get priority for on-ground spaces;<\/li>\n<li>Although the start and end dates of the semester will remain the same, fall break will be cancelled and on-campus class meetings will end before Thanksgiving; all exams will be held online;<\/li>\n<li>We will follow health guidelines in running events;<\/li>\n<li>Enhanced cleaning and disinfecting standards will be implemented;<\/li>\n<li>We will provide appropriate PPE to employees;<\/li>\n<li>We will allow remote working arrangements and alternate work schedules, as appropriate, practical and approved by supervisors.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I am scheduling two Virtual Town Hall sessions to hear your thoughts and feedback. Instructions on how to access these sessions will be provided early next week.<\/p>\n<p>10\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 a.m.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Wednesday, June 3<\/p>\n<p>1 p.m. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Thursday, June 4<\/p>\n<p>I deeply appreciate the hard work and dedication of Provost Byrnes and the task force members in preparing these recommendations for my review.<\/p>\n<p>I hope that you and your family remain safe and have a great weekend.<\/p>\n<p>Sincerely,<\/p>\n<p>Sidney A. McPhee<br \/>President<br \/><a href=\"mailto:Sidney.McPhee@mtsu.edu\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Sidney.McPhee@mtsu.edu<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>To the University community, I am pleased to share with you the report of the COVID-19 Strategic Task Force chaired by Provost Byrnes.\u00a0 As you know, I charged the Task Force to provide recommendations to me for our return to on-campus operations.\u00a0 Please find for your review the full report: www.mtsu.edu\/covidtaskforce. In summary, some of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":398,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2006","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2006","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2006"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2006\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3158,"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2006\/revisions\/3158"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/398"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2006"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2006"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2006"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}