{"id":20664,"date":"2020-03-21T12:19:19","date_gmt":"2020-03-21T12:19:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ahs.uic.edu\/inside-ahs\/news-stories\/a-message-to-ahs-faculty-and-staff-from-dean-fernhall-re-the-stay-at-home-order\/"},"modified":"2020-03-21T12:19:19","modified_gmt":"2020-03-21T12:19:19","slug":"a-message-to-ahs-faculty-and-staff-from-dean-fernhall-re-the-stay-at-home-order","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/ahs.uic.edu\/inside-ahs\/news-stories\/a-message-to-ahs-faculty-and-staff-from-dean-fernhall-re-the-stay-at-home-order\/","title":{"rendered":"A message to AHS faculty and staff from Dean Fernhall re. the stay-at-home order"},"template":"","news_categories":[27],"news_tags":[],"class_list":["post-20664","news","type-news","status-publish","hentry","news_categories-covid-19"],"acf":{"intro_text_subtitle":"","intro_text_body":"

As I am sure you know by now,\u00a0yesterday\u00a0Governor Pritzker announced a stay-at-home order for Illinois<\/a>.\u00a0This order is an important part of the strategy to impede the spread of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) and \u201cflatten the curve.\u201d\u00a0 I urge all of you to take this directive very seriously and stay at home.\u00a0Of course, there are several exemptions to the order, including seeking medical help, going to the grocery store, etc.\u00a0Please make sure you maintain social distancing of at least six feet when you do leave your home.\u00a0We are all responsible for doing our very best to help stem this pandemic. A helpful tool for estimating your risk of being infected with COVID-19 is available at C19check.com\/start<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Several of the exemptions to the stay-at-home order could potentially apply to our faculty and staff, as performing essential functions for the university, including distance education, are exempt. However, I urge you to do your very best to perform these functions from home, if at all possible. Your department heads will continue to assign duties you can perform at home. If you need to come to campus in order to teach or perform other critical functions, please make sure you maintain proper social distancing and coordinate with your department head to ensure there are minimal personnel in our buildings.\u00a0Also remember that buildings will be locked, and you will need your swipe card to enter.<\/p>\n

Another exemption to the stay-at-home order is performing critical research.\u00a0Critical research is defined\u00a0as research critical for patient health such as drug or device trials where cessation of the research would create potential harm to patients.\u00a0Also, research on potential treatments\/prevention of COVID-19 is considered critical.\u00a0Unless your research qualifies under one of these two categories, it is expected you stay at home and not come to campus.<\/p>\n

As the Governor described, this order is not going to be enforced by law enforcement organizations.\u00a0Many have asked whether there is a need for documentation supporting the exemptions, and we do not believe that any special documentation is required. We would, however, suggest that you have your university ID with you when you are traveling to and from work.<\/p>\n

These are very difficult times for all of us.\u00a0I know all of you will do your very best to ensure that our essential functions will be maintained at the highest level possible.\u00a0None of these functions are more important than ensuring our students continue to receive the very best world class education we can provide.\u00a0When we resume instruction March 30, our students will expect nothing less.\u00a0I want to thank you for your herculean efforts in transitioning all of our instruction to online formats.\u00a0I can\u2019t even begin to express how grateful I am that we have the<\/em><\/strong> very best faculty and staff.<\/p>\n

Please be patient and do heed the stay-at-home order, maintain social distancing when you are not at home, and stay safe.\u00a0Together we will weather this very difficult time.\u00a0Finally, I urge you to take this opportunity to stay physically active.\u00a0Go for walks, run, jog, cycle, dance or any other activity you enjoy \u2013 while maintaining social distancing!\u00a0 Physical activity is not only good your body, but also for your brain!<\/p>\n

I encourage you to continue to monitor updates on Inside AHS<\/a>,\u00a0the UIC Today website<\/a> and the University of Illinois System<\/a> website.<\/p>\n

Thank you all!<\/p>\n

Bo Fernhall
\nDean and Professor<\/p>\n","intro_text_excerpt":"Important information about statewide order for faculty and staff","content_author":"Erika Chavez","content_sticky":false,"intro_text_include_image":false,"intro_text_image":false,"intro_text_image_alt_text":"","intro_text_image_caption":"","intro_text_image_attribution":"","news_include_thumbnail":false,"news_thumbnail_image":false,"news_thumbnail_image_alt_text":""},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ahs.uic.edu\/inside-ahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/20664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ahs.uic.edu\/inside-ahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ahs.uic.edu\/inside-ahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ahs.uic.edu\/inside-ahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/20664\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ahs.uic.edu\/inside-ahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news_categories","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ahs.uic.edu\/inside-ahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news_categories?post=20664"},{"taxonomy":"news_tags","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ahs.uic.edu\/inside-ahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news_tags?post=20664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}