Dear Alumni,
I would like to share with you the most recent developments in AIM in light of the corona virus situation in the Philippines.
With the escalation of COVID-19 to Code Red Sublevel 2 by the Philippine Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases and the imposition of community quarantine over the entire National Capital Region (NCR), we continue to implement additional business continuity measures and enhanced precautionary protocols to safeguard the health and wellbeing of all members of the AIM community.
Amidst the uncertainty of this rapidly developing situation, we are committed to ensuring the continuity of essential operations, especially classes and academic activities across all programs. We will aim to make it possible for all students to complete their studies on time.
Our first priority, however, is to protect the health and safety of all members of the AIM community.
For this reason, we have decided that effective Friday, 20 March 2020, all courses in degree and non-degree programs are to be delivered completely online.
Classes are suspended from Friday, 13 March until Thursday, 19 March 2020 (inclusive). During this period, faculty members and program staff will prepare to shift all academic instruction online. This will also allow students to make necessary preparations for remote learning.
We are also concerned about our residential student community. In order to minimize the risk of infection, we will need to significantly reduce the number of students residing on campus. Local students will be asked to vacate their dorm rooms and continue their courses from home through remote learning. Those students whose circumstances prevent them from leaving campus will be asked to discuss their respective case with the concerned office.
It is important to note that AIM will stay “open”, and academic and administrative offices will continue to operate. Our support units are now executing business continuity plans to be able to provide essential services remotely. The Business Continuity Planning (BCP) Team, in consultation with various unit heads, are now finalizing work from home protocols to enable us to continue providing these services to students and various stakeholders while mitigating the risks of potential exposure to the virus.
In the meantime, we appeal to your understanding to strictly observe the directive to limit entry to the school premises to faculty, staff, students, and those with official AIM businesses. We regret that we will not be allowing courtesy visits by alumni or family and friends who do not have official AIM business during this pandemic crisis so as not to unduly put everyone’s health to additional risk. This precautionary measure is aligned with experts’ advice to reduce the concentration of people and observe social distancing to lower the risk of infection.
AIM’ services and amenities such as the Knowledge Resource Center (library), cafeteria, chapel and the swimming pool will also be off-limits to non-AIM students, faculty and staff. The close physical proximity and sharing of resources in these areas may spur the circulation of this contagious disease and pose a significant threat to the health and safety of the community.
With everyone’s full cooperation and support, we are hopeful that members of the AIM community will stay healthy and safe amidst this challenging situation.
Thank you very much for your cooperation.
All the best,
Jikyeong
