RETURN TO CAMPUS-Behind the Scenes of RNAG

The Return to NOVA Advisory Group, or RNAG, meets three days a week to discuss safety concerns, new ideas and progress on projects the group is working to complete. Several projects are on-going, and rely on different departments coming together to complete them. All projects or tasks completed by this group have the overall goal of reopening the college as safely as possible. The RNAG recognizes that the health and safety of the community must come first.

Members from the RNAG team, are from all different campus departments. They bring up concerns and considerations to the team; they also work together to create solutions. One project this group has been working diligently to complete is the ‘physical distancing project.’ The goal for this project is for every individual who enters campus to be able to maintain space around them while they are on campus. It may be hard to imagine how a lively, happy and bustling college campus could offer the space students and staff need to feel safe, but the RNAG team is working hard to make that happen.

RNAG appointed a small, three-person team from the group that began this process by identifying all NOVA courses that are scheduled to be on campus for the fall semester. This information includes the day, time, building, and room each course is set to occur. The planning team took care to add in data about the space available in each room. This information was shared with the group and another team from RNAG was created, the survey team.

From here, the survey team is walking every campus and looking at the classrooms identified by the planning team. They worked with the campus provosts to discuss the number of students that can safely fit in the rooms and assisted the provosts in setting rooms up for courses to be taught safely. This team also noted where instructors would be in the room and made sure instructors have the space they need to teach and still keep a safe distance.

Once this task is completed, the survey team will report back to the group and the next phase of the project will begin. A new team within RNAG will be identified and tasked with finding any hallway traffic flow problems. This means the team will consider when classes in a given building will be starting and ending and how many potential students and staff may be attempting to enter/exit rooms in the building.

NOVA is taking steps to make the return to campus as safe and healthy as possible. The Return to NOVA Advisory Group (RNAG) is working in many different areas to make this possible. The project described above is one of several ongoing considerations the team is working together to complete. Members of the RNAG want to create a safe environment for their fellow nighthawks to return to, and for faculty and staff to feel proud to be a part of the NOVA community.