Spring, Summer and Intersession 2021 terms to be held virtually
McMaster University will continue to host undergraduate academic activities remotely for the Spring/Summer/Intersession term with only a few exceptions for courses that need student access to specialized equipment.
“Spring and summer online courses were incredibly popular last year as they gave students flexibility and the chance to focus on one or two courses,” said Kim Dej, McMaster’s vice-provost, Faculty. “The unique intersession programs will also be running which is another great opportunity for students to explore interdisciplinary topics in one to three-unit courses.”
The dynamic nature of the pandemic means a decision about the Fall 2021 term has not yet been made but McMaster experts and others from across the university are working to develop scenarios that will consider ways to allow as much activity on campus as possible come September.
Spring and Summer courses requiring on-campus components have now been determined and have been updated on Mosaic. The decision was informed by McMaster’s Principles for Academic Decision Making during the COVID-19 pandemic and provincial guidelines for activities on campus.
McMaster staff and instructors are working diligently to facilitate safe teaching and learning spaces including:
- Increased cleaning in high-traffic areas, like washrooms and common areas
- Daily cleaning of all in-use classrooms
- Limiting the number of people on campus
- Restricting access to shared spaces like washrooms
- Requiring masks in all public indoor campus spaces
- Providing physical distancing guidelines for all lab and classroom spaces
- Making hand sanitizer available at all building and classroom entrances
- Communicating physical distancing and reduced classroom capacities with clear signage
- Encouraging physical distancing in hallways, stairways and buildings with directional signs
- Requiring COVID-19 Awareness training for all staff and students who need to come to campus
In addition, before coming to campus, students and instructors are required to complete the following steps:
- Complete McMaster’s mandatory online training at least one day before you need to be on campus (this only needs to be done once)
- Everyone (faculty, staff and students) must complete the Province of Ontario’s self-assessment within an hour each time before you arrive on campus and send confirmation of passing the screening to a supervisor, faculty member or instructor or key contact at the university.
- Information on self-assessment, reporting illness and minimizing expose to COVID-19 are available at the following links: