Dear MTS Community,
I am happy to share that MTS will reopen our campus on June 1st. We will resume pre-COVID-19 on-campus hours of operation, though the library will only be open to faculty, staff, and students.
Given the safety and efficacy of the vaccine, members of the MTS community are strongly encouraged to take advantage of receiving it. Healthcare professionals remind us that we have duties to people we have never met simply because we live in the same community. It’s our interlocking sense of obligation that makes public health work for the good of all. In a similar way, we at MTS embody Jesus’s command that we love our neighbor as ourselves.
MTS’s current COVID-19 policies and guidelines will remain in place even as more and more members of our community receive the vaccine. While receiving the vaccine is an important public health measure, it does not replace the essentials of mask wearing, hand washing, social distancing, staying home when sick, and frequent COVID-19 testing.
It is not yet known whether a vaccine prevents asymptomatic infections and if there’s still the possibility that a vaccinated person could transmit the virus without knowing it. Continue following these public health protocols, even after you have received your vaccination:
·Continue to wear a face-covering over your nose, mouth, and chin when you are around others.
·Continue to maintain social distancing, giving others at least 6 feet of space.
·Continue to wash your hands with soap and water thoroughly and often, and to use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer when hand-washing is not immediately possible.
·Continue to wipe down shared surfaces, such as desks and tables, computer keyboards and mice, light switches, and other items.
·Continue to monitor COVID-19 symptoms daily and stay home when sick.
We will be offering three different modes of academic delivery this fall. That way, students who feel safer in remote learning may continue their education off-campus if approved by their professors.
Please don’t hesitate to reach out to me personally if you have any questions or concerns.
With deepest gratitude and prayerful blessings,
Rev. Dr. Jody Hill
President