The president of Danville Area Community College says faculty, staff and students have been amazingly resilient during the national COVID-19 emergency. Stephen Nacco says the college has operated exclusively online since March 30th.
And although May 30th will come and go without a Commencement ceremony the DACC president added on WDAN Radio’s Newsmakers program that they hope to have one sometime this summer….
{‘’Sometime in the summer, and summer as far as I can tell goes through like September 19th, we do want to be able to do that because students work very hard for their degree. And not a lot of them really leave the area. They still have family in the area and they could conceivably come back for Commencement,’’ said Nacco.}
Nacco says Danville Area Community College was fortunate because two years ago DACC Executive Vice President Dave Kietzman had developed a plan on how to continue operations in the event of a catastrophic shutdown. At the time there had been some worldwide concern about bird flu….
{‘’What if the bird flu caused a catastrophic shutdown of the campus – immediately? What would you do? And the answer was we had to have every shell, every course online and ready to run. And that’s how we got to operationalize this nightmare,’’ said Nacco.}
And Nacco adds that although classes are online, all students will get real grades – not just a pass-fail rank. The DACC president says the regular grades are important for those students who plan on transferring to a four-year college.
Some classes will not be able to be completed until the coronavirus crisis ends. For example, students in the Nursing program need clinical training. Dr. Nacco says those courses will be completed just as soon as it is deemed safe for students to be at hospitals and nursing homes.
Registration for fall classes begins on Monday, April 20th online. And this year DACC is offering about 80 courses at half the normal cost which will all transfer to a four year college or university.
