Law School Update on COVID-19
Dear UCI Law Community:
We know that these are unsettling times. We wanted to reach out to you as soon as possible to follow up on Chancellor Gillman’s March 10, 2020 email to the UCI Community regarding COVID-19 and Academic and Operational Activity. As Chancellor Gillman’s message indicates, there are no confirmed cases of COVID-19 within the UCI community at this time, and the UCI campus remains open.
Your health and safety are of paramount importance. As a precaution, by Monday, March 16, all law school class sessions will be held remotely until further notice.
To ensure a coordinated and effective transition to remote instruction, we will begin phasing in remote instruction immediately, beginning this Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. If any of your courses are part of this phase-in, your instructor will notify you right away with detailed instructions.
For courses meeting in person this week, it is essential that you stay home if you have symptoms of illness, including fever or symptoms of respiratory illness, such as a cough, difficulty breathing, or shortness of breath, or if you have reason to believe that you have been exposed to COVID-19.
You will not be penalized if you miss class this week. As many courses as possible are being recorded, and as previously indicated, instructors understand the need to be flexible with attendance policies.
If you are a student, who does not have access to either a computer and/or the internet, please contact Dr. Jennah Jones at jjones@law.uci.edu.
Although the law school is implementing remote instruction, the campus remains open, and courses will continue, with final exams administered on a take-home or other appropriate basis, and grades submitted according to the normal schedule.
In response to student questions, we reached out to campus housing. We were assured that graduate students are welcome to stay in their campus homes. Housing will send additional information to residents.
We are committed to maintaining our daily operations, completing the semester, and ensuring that all students can fulfill their academic requirements.
For more information, campus has established the UCI Coronavirus (COVID-19) Response Center. Students, staff, faculty, parents, and community partners may email covid19@uci.edu to or visit the website: https://ehs.uci.edu/PublicHealth/coronavirus.html.
We will provide additional information as we implement the transition to remote instruction. We appreciate everybody’s understanding through these challenging times.
L. Song Richardson
Dean and Chancellor's Professor of Law
Chris Whytock
Vice Dean and Professor of Law