Governor Andrew Cuomo on Thursday said that the state would issue guidance to colleges and universities that would allow for some "face to face" programming and classes in the fall.
The announcement was the first confirmation that in-person classes would be allowed in New York state, although the governor said that educational institutions needed to provide government officials with detailed plans.
"Colleges can go and get examples of considerations, but we need reopening plans, monitoring plans, containment plans, and shutdown plans," he said, during his press briefing.
In the wake of the shutdowns, colleges and universities across the country have transitioned to online learning. Many schools are still struggling with deciding when and how regular classes can resume. In one of the biggest announcements, California State University, the nation’s largest four-year public university system, last month said that classes at all of its 23 campuses would be canceled and replaced by online instruction.
Among the host of issues Cuomo said New York's educational leaders must address is their school's capacity to maintain social distancing, establishing screening and testing as well as protections for vulnerable populations, and how they will identify outbreaks as well as safely evacuate and shut down the campus.
In a sign of the eagerness to take some step toward normalcy, the city's two largest private universities, New York University and Columbia have both indicated that in-person classes could occur as early as the fall with safety measures in place, including reduced density.
Late last month, NYU Provost Katherine Fleming wrote in an email to students that the school planned "to reconvene in person, with great care, in the fall (subject to government health directives), both in New York and at our Global sites."
Columbia, meanwhile, was more vague in its update to the school community, saying the university would treat the three upcoming academic terms—fall 2020, spring 2021, and summer 2021—as one continuous instruction period.
"By leveraging a longer period of time, we will be able to de-densify our campus so that all students may experience much, if not most, of their coursework in person over the arc of the three terms," said Lee Bollinger, Columbia University president. He promised that more details would come on July 1st.
The City University of New York, which is facing massive budget cuts, last month told faculty and staff to prepare for a "primarily virtual Fall 2020," with only a small fraction of classes meeting in person. The CUNY system has 25 campuses serving more than 500,000 students.
CUNY Chancellor Matos Rodríguez has appointed two task forces to help prepare each college for "individualized, unit-level plans for reopening."
