[CHM 112] COVID-19 Concerns

[Andrew J. Pounds]

Students -- someone voiced a concern about having a COVID-19 positive
student in our class.   To my knowledge in our class there was only ONE
person that was COVID-19 positive.   That person was diagnosed as
positive before the term began.   The person in question wanted to take
the class in person and took ALL of the measures prescribed to get the
clearance to come back to campus and class.   For the first week and a
half of class that person participated in our class online only.  That
was a stop-gap measure that I was asked to implement to help get them
academically prepared to complete CHM 112 on campus.   The person that
had COVID-19 was NEVER in your classroom or in the lab with us.  They
were cleared by their personal physician while at home and made a good
faith effort to come back to campus -- which was part of the agreement
for them taking CHM 112 second session.  However, with the utmost
caution, I would not allow them back into the classroom or the lab until
they had been cleared by Mercer Medicine.  The CLAS Dean's office was
aware of this situation and had provided me with the name of the nurse
at Mercer Medicine assigned to the case prior to the term beginning.  
The moment I heard that the person was coming back to campus (and prior
to them actually getting back to campus) I reached out to the Nurse
again so that she could be on top of things.   She was.  It was through
this process that the students was again tested and ultimately denied
access to the the Godsey Science Center; the student is no longer in
your class.

To the best of my knowledge and based on the Mercer screening process,
none of you have been exposed in either my class or my lab, to someone
that is COVID-19 positive.  I will continue to take forehead
temperatures before every meeting and we will continue to practice the
COVID-19 procedures prescribed by the University to help reduce the risk
of any of you getting COVID-19 as a result of attending and
participating in my class. 


-- 
Andrew J. Pounds, Ph.D.  (pounds_aj at mercer.edu)
Professor of Chemistry and Computer Science
Director of the Computational Science Program
Mercer University,  Macon, GA 31207   (478) 301-5627