The University of Kentucky plans to return to ‘more normal’ operations in the fall
The University of Kentucky is planning to return to largely in-person classes next fall, the university’s president announced in an email to the campus on Friday.
Planning for the fall is still underway but the university plans “to return to levels of in-person instruction in similar numbers to that of fall 2019 in terms of course delivery and attendance,” UK President Eli Capilouto wrote in the email nearly a year after university officials first largely shut down the campus because of concerns over local spread of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We know that this past year has not been easy,” Capilouto wrote. “But your hard work, your commitment to a safe and healthy community and the prospects of a campus that is vaccinated and protected make planning for a return to more normal operations possible.”
The university will finalize the details of the return to in-person instruction over the summer — which will be the end of a mixed system of online, hybrid and in-person classes that UK has been in since fall 2020. Capilouto wrote that the university has set up a Return-to-Work Committee with employees across campus that will help formulate the plan for the return of all employees to campus.
“While we still will offer flexibility to supervisors in determining remote work options for their respective units, we are prioritizing getting our employees back on campus so we can continue to fulfill our promise as Kentucky’s university,” Capilouto wrote in the email. “We are a residential research campus. It is part of what makes us distinctive and special. We must have the staff on campus to support that environment.”
Earlier this week, the university also announced that it would be having in-person graduation ceremonies for 2020 and spring 2021 graduates at Rupp Arena in May — the university’s first-such event since December 2019.