BY: Darby Childress

Today, Clemson Universities president, Jim Clements, announced the school’s current plan to battle COVID-19, while allowing students to return to campus for a somewhat normal fall semester. This plan includes Students and faculty are being required to provide a negative COVID-19 test result prior to the start of the fall semester.

Students and faculty are being required to wear a face mask in all university buildings, during all university programs held in non-university buildings, all university vehicles, and outdoors on campus when social distancing cannot be practiced. The university also announced that they are making adjustments to the classrooms to allow for social distancing to practiced within the classroom. In addition to this, in-person classes will be “blended” with some online classes, and cameras and microphones will be installed in classrooms to record lectures to be live-streamed and recorded for instruction outside of the classroom. According to the announcement the university hopes to have a “75 percent of all courses to have some class periods dedicated to in-person interactions among instructors and students”. Clemson University is also requesting that the students ensure that they: wash their hands frequently, practice social distancing outside of the required areas, responsibly manage living spaces, limit group sizes, and participate in self-assessments. The university did not state how they plan to enforce these policies or the repercussions of not following the above guidelines.