A Statement from IT Sligo Registrar – Dr Michele Glacken
August 2020
Dear students,
I hope that you all had a restful summer and are looking forward to returning to college.
Over the last 2 months we have been monitoring the Public Health guidelines in relation to COVID 19 and modifying the college environment accordingly. The social distancing guidance requires that we deliver all our programmes in semester 1 in a blended format. This means a combination of delivery online and on campus attendance. The ratio of on-campus to remote online delivery is specific to each programme. For example, programmes that have lab based/ studio based work will require more on campus attendance than those who do not have this requirement. Please be assured that the required safety precautions will in place for your on-campus attendance. Programme teams gave significant consideration to how campus attendance would work to meet the learning outcomes of your programmes and be effective for you as the learner prior to the summer holiday period. In some cases attendance will be in blocks (collection of days together) and in other cases it will require you to attend on a number of days per week or per fortnight. Whilst on campus you will be with same group of students on each occasion to enable contract tracing to be conducted efficiently if required. The timetabling office is currently finalising timetables which the relevant Heads of Departments will check on their return from leave on September 1st . Once approved, timetables will be shared with you.
All of the usual academic, health, learning supports will be available to you in Semester 1 and we have increased the supports in these areas for the next academic year. We will be advising you of how you can liaise with all supports remotely prior to the commencement of teaching on September 28th.
As the student accommodation is independent of the Institute, the student’s union are liaising with the various accommodation providers in relation to accommodation requirements in semester 1 given the proposed format of delivery and on campus attendance. I have been assured that the accommodation providers will have the required infrastructure in place to support your engagement in online learning.
The student’s union are also working hard on how you can participate in the non-academic aspects of college life whilst adhering to the Public Health Guidelines.
A decision will be made in November on how Semester 2 will run.
I will advise you of any new information that I may have next week.
Regards Michele
Dr. Michele Glacken
Registrar
For further information on re-opening of our campus, please go to www.itsligo.ie/covid-19