USM To Continue Online Classes For 6 Months Amid Covid-19 Pandemic

Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) is telling its students and staff to just keep staying at home amid the Covid-19 pandemic.

In a posting made on Facebook, USM plans to continue operating remotely until the month of September, instead of just during the two-week Movement Control Order (MCO) placed from March 18 – 31.

Calling it the “USM Project Overcome” the university aims to complete its 2020 academic year by having all of its classes, lectures and exams online, and to only allow limited access to its campuses.

During the project, USM staff would also be allowed to work from home, with the university claiming that only 10% of their manpower is currently working on-site.

Following the nationwide MCO, USM had also begun temporarily distributing an RM10 per-day worth of food and grocery coupons to more than 3,600 of its students that are currently living on campus grounds as well as other financial support aimed at helping the B40 income groups within its community.

The project was laid out following numerous feedback and input the university had received from its stakeholders in order to protect its 14,000-plus students and staff against the risk of exposure to the deadly coronavirus.

The university had previously outlined a list of initiatives including the setup of a setting up a special crisis committee to safeguard the well-being and safety of its community members following the global pandemic.

All USM’s undergraduate, post-graduate, Ph.D., and Masters programs will resume in April, for more details you can check out the full post, below.