Shelter-In-Place Order for Galveston County Includes TAMUG    

Galveston County has announced a countywide shelter-in-place order effective 11:59 p.m. tonight, Tuesday, March 24, 2020, continuing through 11:59 p.m. Friday, April 3, 2020. This order includes the Galveston Campus of Texas A&M University on Pelican Island. 

Selfless Service
 
Texas A&M-Galveston Chief Operating Officer Col. Michael E. Fossum ‘80 said this measure should be an easy one to follow for Aggies by the sea as it goes hand-in-hand with a few of Texas A&M’s Core Values, namely, selfless service.
 
“When Aggies consider how they can enact the core value of selfless service, they can follow this order and any other mandated by a campus or city official to help protect and ensure the safety of others,” Fossum explained. “We are a campus community and an island community and it’s our duty as Aggies to protect each other.”
 
Mayor Jim Yarbrough and the City of Galveston are directing residents to heed the Galveston County order for the public health and safety of our residents. The city urges Texas A&M University at Galveston students to do their part to safeguard the community and slow the spread of COVID-19, and thanks students, staff and faculty in advance for their cooperation.
 
“If you have no critical place you absolutely need to be, you need to be in your home and away from others,” Yarbrough said. “Our first priority is protecting the health and safety of residents. Should compliance with the governor’s orders and suggestions be lax, the City of Galveston is prepared along with the state to take additional measures to ensure we are doing all we can to slow the spread of the COVID19 virus.”
 
Critical aspects of our university operations are considered essential under the order and these will continue. These include but are not limited to: food services that are available to-go, emergency responders, public safety, mail services, residence halls, janitorial and maintenance services, technology support, financial services, construction where approved, utilities and scientific research.
 
For Students
 
This order allows students to leave their residence only for essential activities, such as going to the grocery store or picking up to-go meals on campus or from restaurants, visiting a healthcare professional and engaging in outdoor activity, such as walking, hiking, running, or riding a bicycle, while exercising proper social distancing behaviors.
 
Students may also leave to go to university-designated locations for accessing computers and internet resources as indicated on the Keep Learning Galveston website. Please note that all building entrances will revert to controlled access for students, faculty and staff in order to comply with this order.
 
Student health and counseling options are available no matter our students’ location. Counseling information is available by contacting Director of Counseling, Career & Ability Services Ken Bailey at 409-740-4725. Additional student health options have been developed to include Telemedicine with the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston. Details on this service are available here.
 
The library will be closed, however, library personnel will continue digitizing resources to support online teaching. Access to all of the libraries' digital resources and online research support will continue uninterrupted.
 
Paid undergraduate student workers may continue to carry out important support functions necessary for continuing laboratory operation.
 
Please consult the Galveston Campus COVID-19 site for facility availability and hours of operation updates.
 
For Faculty & Staff
 
All building entrances will revert to controlled access for faculty, staff and students. As of this evening, all non-essential university offices will limit face-to-face interactions and move to virtual support.
 
For faculty and graduate students who are teaching or supporting instruction, an essential priority is continuing our crucial online course instruction and activities needed to support teaching.
 
We encourage faculty and graduate students who are teaching courses to develop methods that allow for the continuation of instruction that minimizes time on campus. Those individuals who need to access their offices to teach an online course should contact their respective department heads to make sure they will retain access. Please refer to the Keep Teaching and Learning Commons website for additional teaching resources.
 
The Office of Research provides the following guidance to those faculty, staff and students conducting ongoing scientific research: To the extent possible, Texas A&M-Galveston researchers are encouraged to engage in activities that can be performed remotely (e.g., writing, data analysis, etc.); essential laboratory operations are permissible, provided they can be performed while meeting the Center for Disease Control social distancing guidelines of six feet of separation.
 
Please see https://vpr.tamu.edu/ for additional information.
  
Any individual who is in a high-risk category is not be required to come to campus.

For more information on Texas A&M-Galveston’s coronavirus and COVID-19 response, please visit: tamug.edu/covid-19/.