Worcester Business Journal

12 Worcester Business Journal | April 13, 2020 | wbjournal.com Uncertain future With their admissions calendars disrupted and fall semesters in doubt due to COVID-19 social distancing, college leaders are preparing for the unknown F irst, college leaders had to look at the coronavirus threat and make a potentially heart-wrenching decision: Should on-campus classes be canceled? Should students be sent home from their dorms? In short order, school leaders uniform- ly decided yes. en came the other hard part: quickly moving classes online while keeping staff and students safe. Now comes the period of the unknown. College leaders in Central Massachusetts are grappling with an upturned admissions period and wondering what fall enrollment will look like if students decide they don't want to – or are unable to – travel far for school, or even whether a fall semester would be able to take place on campus anyway. For a school more heavily reliant on students coming from the other side of the country or across the world, that may mean the student body at Worcester Polytechnic Institute this fall is made up of more relatively local students. For those who draw far more locally anyway, such as Fitchburg State University, the upheaval could mean more students on campus this fall. Community colleges could be due for an upswing in the number of students as they saw during the Great Recession. In that case, Quinsigamond Community College in Worcester, Mount Wachusett Community College in Gardner and others were flooded with people out of work looking to earn a new degree or job training to enter a new field. It could be that way again. "Because we're wired that way all the time, that makes us more prepared to be able to address this," said Lee Ann Scales, the vice president of enrollment and public affairs at MWCC. Getting operational online Among the first things colleges had to do in March was get all their courses online so students could finish the semester remotely. at was easier for some than others. At UMass Medical School in Worcester, for example, lectures were always recorded. Now, instructors simply talk to a camera in an empty room instead of one filled with students. UMass also made the decision to graduate its 135 four-year medical students more than a month early to allow them to help treat coronavirus patients. Lee Ann Scales, the vice president of enrollment and public affairs at Mount Wachusett Community College BY GRANT WELKER Worcester Business Journal News Editor College of the Holy Cross students were told to move out of their dorms by March 14, given only a few days' notice, as the Worcester school looked to slow the spread of coronavirus. PHOTO/GRANT WELKER

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