RCC extends Spring Break, goes online for beginning of next term

mid a whirlwind of changes at area schools due to precautions over the new coronavirus, Rogue Community College (RCC) announced its plans on Friday.

The school will extend Spring Break for another week, effectively making it March 23 through April 6. Campus services, including the bookstore, will remain open during that time for normal hours.

The schedule is almost identical to what SOU announced earlier this week.

“Slowing the spread of this virus helps ensure that our health care systems are not overwhelmed and able to respond to all community health care needs in a timely and effective way,” Kemper-Pelle wrote in an email to faculty and staff.

Winter term finals week will go ahead as scheduled, though faculty have been encouraged to move exams online wherever feasible. Students will have to contact their individual instructors for more details.

Spring term begins April 6, and the first two weeks of the term will be taught online “for all classes,” RCC said. Faculty and staff are currently working on making those arrangements, and students will be clued in on the method before the term begins.

In the meantime, RCC computer labs will still be available for students to access, and members of the Southern Oregon Higher Education Consortium — RCC, Southern Oregon University, Klamath Community College and Oregon Tech — have agreed to allow each other’s students to use their computer labs and WiFi networks as needed.

RCC had previously announced a number of preventive measures, effective through April 30, that included limiting all non-essential meetings and travel, canceling events of more than 75 people, increasing sanitizing of public areas, and adding more sanitizing stations and signs encouraging students and employees to wash their hands frequently.