COVID-19 Updates for Community

Dear Community Partners, 

In response to the public health interest that COVID-19 has garnered, George Mason, along with many other universities in the region, has suspended our campus activities for the remainder of the semester and moved to online instruction. Students, faculty and staff are currently navigating this move and in the SAIL office we know that this action has a tremendous impact on you as you work to serve the communities around us. We understand that many of you depend on our students as volunteers during the school year and this uncertain time is just as stressful. 

Our friends over at Volunteer Fairfax are working diligently to share opportunities and donation requests from organizations across Northern Virginia. If you know of an agency that has needs during this COVID-19 emergency, please have them complete this brief Volunteer Opportunities Survey to help promote the opportunity.

As we adjust to this temporary reality, we want to share some important tips and strategies  that may be useful for you. 

Reach out to faculty and student volunteers. 

• If your agency is remaining open or limiting operations, please share that information with students and faculty that you are working with. 
• Some faculty, in light of new transportation issues with students moving off-campus, may offer alternatives to service learning hours, but there are some students who may be able to remain in the area and may find that continuing their service will be helpful to sustain a sense of normalcy. 
• If you are remaining open, be sure to share any precautions your agency may be doing that might impact student volunteers. 

Online or remote opportunities

• If you are closing or limiting access to your facilities, now might be a great time to assess if there are any remote opportunities that your agency may need. This can take the form of phone banking, social media posts, developing flyers or brochures, research or even crowdfunding. 
• To help students who are still seeking volunteer hours, we've developed a brief survey for you to complete so that we can share with students and faculty as they navigate this online reality.  Please complete the survey here. We’ll be sharing that with our faculty once classes resume on March 23rd. 

As an office, we are committed to supporting our faculty, students and community partners during this unique time, we will be sure to keep you updated with any developments and post other relevant information on our website. 

We’ve shared some resources and tips for our faculty on our website as well, please feel free to view here. 

Thank you for working with our students and faculty in this confusing time. Mason looks forward to continuing to work with you as we move through this. 

If you have any other questions, please feel free to reach out to sail@gmu.edu.