{"id":2033,"date":"2021-03-15T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-03-15T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/blogtest\/march-15-2021-back-together-this-fall\/"},"modified":"2026-04-15T15:15:59","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T20:15:59","slug":"march-15-2021-back-together-this-fall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/march-15-2021-back-together-this-fall\/","title":{"rendered":"MARCH 15, 2021: Back Together this Fall!"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>

To\u00a0the\u00a0University community,<\/span><\/p>\n

Today marks the midpoint of the Spring 2021 semester! We begin by\u00a0<\/span>celebrating our MTSU\u2019s Women\u2019s Basketball Team, who captured the Conference USA Championship Saturday night<\/span><\/a>\u00a0by defeating Rice University in the finals in Frisco, Texas. They are heading to the NCAA Tournament and learn their opponent tonight!<\/span><\/p>\n

Their win this weekend is yet another sign of hope and renewal. In reaching\u00a0<\/span>mid-semester<\/span>, I am once again awed\u00a0by\u00a0the\u00a0amazing and enormous efforts\u00a0by\u00a0all\u00a0of\u00a0you \u2013 students, faculty and staff \u2013\u00a0to protect our community during this pandemic and stay on course with our academics, research and service progress. This hard work and commitment has made possible the full return of in-person campus classes and activities for\u00a0the\u00a0Fall 2021 semester.<\/p>\n

You may recall that\u00a0<\/span>we announced in late December\u00a0our intention<\/span><\/a>\u00a0to fully reopen the campus for classes and events\u00a0we enjoyed before the onset of the pandemic. We are encouraged by\u00a0the\u00a0tremendous progress made recently in vaccination efforts in the state and\u00a0the nation<\/span>\u00a0\u2013\u00a0<\/span>including those on our campus\u00a0by\u00a0our School\u00a0of\u00a0Nursing faculty and students and Student Health Services<\/span><\/a>\u00a0<\/span>staff. President\u00a0Biden announced last Thursday that he directed the states to allow all adults be eligible for vaccination\u00a0by\u00a0May 1.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Our course offerings will be back to normal \u2014 primarily in-person but with selected online options. We will use the lessons we learned from teaching during the pandemic, and the technology we installed to help us enhance our academic offerings even stronger. Our residence halls will reopen as before, with both single- and double-occupancy options.\u00a0<\/span>The\u00a0faculty, administrators and coaches in Academics,\u00a0Athletics and Student Affairs are currently planning a robust return to\u00a0the\u00a0activities, events and games that enrich\u00a0the\u00a0student experience on our campus.\u00a0We will be back together this fall with more resilience and vigor than ever.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Finishing Strong this Semester<\/span><\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

While\u00a0there\u2019s light at\u00a0the\u00a0end\u00a0of\u00a0the\u00a0tunnel, we must maintain our efforts to contain and control COVID-19 as we wind down the Spring semester. To that end,\u00a0our campus mandates for\u00a0the\u00a0wearing\u00a0of\u00a0masks, social distancing and observing posted safety capacities in our rooms and facilities remain in\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/span>place.\u00a0<\/span><\/strong>We feel this is necessary so we can understand potential impacts that variants of the virus may pose.<\/span><\/p>\n

However, we feel confident in our containment efforts to now allow\u00a0on-campus groups\u00a0to reserve spaces in campus buildings for activities, including end-of-the-year activities. Again, current COVID-19 capacities, as well as social distancing and\u00a0masking requirements, apply.\u00a0<\/span>Food<\/span>\u00a0will\u00a0not\u00a0be\u00a0permitted for\u00a0these events, a necessary step we\u2019re taking to further protect our community. Off-campus groups\u00a0may also schedule space, under\u00a0the\u00a0same rules as on-campus groups, including that\u00a0there is no food and masking\/social distancing rules apply.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Summer camps and conferences will be allowed in campus facilities, but overnight accommodations will not be allowed except by limited exception and only for academically related groups, such as the Governor\u2019s School for\u00a0the\u00a0Arts. Again, masks, social distancing and capacity limits will be required.<\/span><\/p>\n

Thank you for your continued diligence in our fight against COVID-19. Let\u2019s finish strong for\u00a0the\u00a0second half\u00a0of\u00a0this semester! And I\u2019m looking forward\u00a0<\/span>to the\u00a0return\u00a0of\u00a0our commencement exercises to Murphy Center this May.<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

Sincerely,
<\/span>Sidney A. McPhee
<\/span>President
<\/span>Sidney.McPhee@mtsu.edu<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To\u00a0the\u00a0University community, Today marks the midpoint of the Spring 2021 semester! We begin by\u00a0celebrating our MTSU\u2019s Women\u2019s Basketball Team, who captured the Conference USA Championship Saturday night\u00a0by defeating Rice University in the finals in Frisco, Texas. They are heading to the NCAA Tournament and learn their opponent tonight! Their win this weekend is yet another […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":450,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2033","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\/2033","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=2033"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2033\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3136,"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2033\/revisions\/3136"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/450"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mtsu.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}