Announcements

We are very pleased to welcome back our faculty and students from Spring Break and to look ahead to the second half of the semester. It has now been two years since our community first experienced the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. This has been one of the most challenging periods in Penn’s long history, yet it has also been a time of extraordinary resilience, perseverance, and partnership. Together, we have sustained our historic university missions of teaching and research, while striving to keep each other safe and supported through many unpredictable changes.

The invasion of Ukraine has marshaled Penn’s powerful sense of solidarity to help communities who are suffering, near or far. Time and again, we are inspired by the efforts of our students, faculty, and staff to find ways to help others—to comfort, heal, and bring hope in times of the greatest struggles.

Recent events in Ukraine have generated great concern around the world and on our campus, especially for those in our community with personal ties to the region. We are writing to express our condemnation of the violence in Ukraine and our solidarity with those who are suffering as a result of the incursion. This is an uncertain situation, and we do not know how events will unfold over the coming weeks and months, but we urge community members to seek out the support resources you may need during this time.

We continue to monitor our shared progress in lowering the COVID positivity rate on campus. We are very pleased that the campus positivity rate, as posted today on the University Dashboard, is now at a remarkably low 0.97%.

We are very pleased to update you about positive trends in the COVID-19 situation on campus. The campus positivity rate, as posted on the University Dashboard today, is now 1.8%, including a dramatic one-week decrease among undergraduate students to 2.99% and a remarkable 0.84% rate among graduate and professional students.

With heavy hearts, we write to share that Mia Bezar ’23, a student in the College of Arts and Sciences, passed away Sunday, February 13th, 2022. Mia was majoring in Political Science, with minors in Urban Studies and French and Francophone Studies.

Having now been confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Amy Gutmann, Penn’s president for the past 17 years, will soon be sworn in as United States Ambassador to Germany.

Scott Bok, Chair of the University of Pennsylvania Board of Trustees, today announced that former Provost Wendell Pritchett has been selected to serve as Interim President of the University, effective at such time as Amy Gutmann may be confirmed and resign to serve as Ambassador to Germany. Pritchett would serve in the role through June 30, 2022.

Dear Penn Community, With heavy hearts, we write to share that Tolamariam Nemomsa ’24, a student in the College, passed away this week in his off-campus residence. He was 21. From an early age, Tola, as he was known, was passionate about community health, specifically issues affecting his home state of Colorado. Committed to learning more about disparities in health care, he had the honor of being selected as a Pre-Health Scholar at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus.

We are grateful to every member of the Penn community who has come together to help us get through this latest phase of the COVID pandemic. We will return to in-person classes as scheduled on Monday (January 24). On that day, we will also resume the hybrid work plan for staff that first went into effect last year.