The University of Massachusetts Lowell plans to offer up to 30 percent of its course sections in in-person and hybrid formats for the spring semester and to more than double its current residential student population to up to 2,000, the school said Monday.
“With a half-semester of experience and lessons learned about safely conducting classes and university operations in the midst of the pandemic, we’re confident we can expand our on-campus population, in-person learning and activities in January,” Chancellor Jacquie Moloney wrote in a Monday letter to the campus community.
Spring classes will begin on Jan. 25, 2021, a week later than previously planned, to give students time to arrive and quarantine before moving in to the dorms.
All residential students and a “strategic sample” of commuter students, faculty and staff will be tested weekly for COVID-19, UMass Lowell officials said in a press release.
Moloney said only two cases have been identified out of the 8,764 surveillance tests the university has conducted so far, for a positive rate of 0.023 percent.
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