Announcements

Words cannot adequately convey the anger, grief and frustration that we are all experiencing during this difficult time for our city and country. Yet out of our despair, we can also perceive hope.

Once again our nation mourns. The tragic and senseless death of George Floyd is a vivid reminder of the inequalities and unacceptable indignities that so many of our citizens constantly endure. The events in Minneapolis this week should lead everyone to recognize how much more work our society must do to realize liberty and justice for all. As a nation we have much work to do.

With the semester’s end and our moving, bittersweet virtual Commencement for the Class of 2020 only days behind us, we are writing to update you on our planning and preparations for the fall. At this time, predictions for the fall of the pandemic’s progression and our society’s capacities for testing, contact tracing and treatment are sufficiently uncertain that we cannot say with perfect clarity what the fall semester will look like.

Dear Deans J. Larry Jameson, Antonia Villarruel, and Mark Wolff, We, the Deans of schools at the University of Pennsylvania, on behalf of our communities of employees and students, want to thank the Deans and their faculty and staff at the Perelman School of Medicine, School of Nursing, and School of Dental Medicine for their brave and commendable response to the pandemic. 

As we approach the end of the spring semester, we write to update you with the latest information on our planning and the important elements that will influence the decisions about how we move forward during this pandemic.

As is true for all universities in the United States, the COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant financial impact on the University of Pennsylvania. Penn has experienced a substantial increase in costs to support students in the move from campus to online learning, combined with lost revenue across many areas of the University.

The guiding priority of the University, from the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic, has been to protect the health and safety of Penn students, faculty, staff, postdocs, patients, and visitors. Moving to a virtual learning platform and depopulating the campus in a matter of days required an unprecedented effort. We are profoundly grateful to everyone at Penn who contributed to facilitate this extraordinary transition.

We are grateful to all of you for your hard work and creativity in resuming classes—and for your patience in navigating the many unwanted disruptions to our semester. We are writing now to let you know that our current remote learning plan will extend to all credit-bearing courses scheduled to begin on May 26, including both Summer Session I and the 11-week Summer Session. This decision, while not taken lightly, arises from the indefinite stay-at-home order in Philadelphia and the need to resume campus activities only when it is considered safe do so.

Today we are announcing that the University of Pennsylvania’s interruption of all onsite operations, except for those that are life-sustaining essential employees, will continue until further notice. We will keep you updated well in advance when more information is available on an exact date for returning to onsite operations.

We are enormously grateful for your patience and understanding during the events of the past few weeks. None of us expected—or wanted—the disruptions to this semester. We are now excited to return on Monday to teaching and learning, our most important work together as a Penn community.