Dear Faculty, Staff and Students,
The safety and security of our Kansas City University (KCU) family is our number-one priority as we find our lives further upended by the global coronavirus pandemic. These are undoubtedly challenging times and we are navigating uncharted territory. KCU is committed to enlisting the best resources and expertise available to mitigate the spread of the virus and ensure the most positive outcomes for our campus community and the communities we serve.
Crisis response begins with an approach that incorporates a dedication to Preparation, Knowledge and Action. In 2015, KCU formed the Crisis Management Team (CMT) to be responsible for planning KCU responses to various manmade or natural disasters - including infectious disease. Exercises are held on a regular basis to address various scenarios.
Preparation
With the worsening coronavirus situation in Washington state, we activated the CMT to direct efforts toward minimizing the effects of the outbreak by instituting appropriate public health practices, maintaining continuity of our academic programs and ensuring our mission of improving the well-being of the communities we serve. The CMT has established clear, detailed procedures and protocols that are updated daily to assure we are most appropriately responding to this pandemic.
Knowledge
We will continue to share these resources so that our community is knowledgeable on the latest developments and recommendations.
Action
Based upon the current information received, KCU implemented a number of actions in response to this dynamic situation to help ensure the health and safety of our campus community.
These include, but are not limited to:
- Providing information on public health best practices and prevention
- Enhancing campus cleaning and hygiene protocols
- Minimizing outside campus visitors
- Requiring self-reporting of all international and certain domestic travel
- Requiring self-monitoring upon return when necessary
- Implementing web-based learning for students
- Encouraging remote working for employees when possible
- Canceling non-essential travel
- Canceling, rescheduling or reformatting delivery of on-campus events
- Discouraging attendance at off-campus events
- Providing ongoing communications and updates to students, faculty and staff through our dedicated web page, social media, messages from leadership and intranet postings
As a reminder, social distancing remains key to the goal of slowing the spread of infection, thereby reducing the stress on our health-care system's finite capacity (
The New York Times
).
Managers and department chairs remain valuable contacts for any questions or concerns. Also, continue to monitor our
COVID-19 web page
for updates and email questions to
[email protected]
.
No doubt, there will be challenges and uncertainty ahead. However, through preparation, knowledge and action we can help attenuate the spread of the coronavirus, support one another and live our KCU mission. I am blessed to be a part of this Kansas City University community and together we will surely come through this ordeal stronger.
