Dear Marietta College Community, 

As we prepare to welcome everyone back to campus for the Spring 2022 semester, it is important to update you on the College’s plans regarding the ever changing issues surrounding COVID-19. 

While we had really hoped to switch to a mask-optional policy starting on January 13th, we still have not reached our goal of 80-percent vaccination rate for campus. Also, the increase in positive cases due to the highly infectious omicron variant makes it difficult to make any changes right now. 

Therefore, we will continue to require everyone to wear a mask while indoors — unless you are eating, exercising or in your own workspace — throughout January. We will review our policy at the end of the month. 

Our goal is to help protect the health and well-being of our campus community, and we believe following the CDC’s guideline of everyone being fully vaccinated is the best way to do it. Employees who are deemed fully vaccinated have either 1) received a booster two or more weeks ago, or 2) received a second Moderna/Pfizer vaccine less than six months ago or the single-shot J&J vaccine less than two months ago. If you are eligible for a COVID-19 booster but have not gotten it, you are not considered fully vaccinated. 

We strongly encourage all students and employees to share their vaccination status — including boosters — with the Center for Health & Wellness (students) at healthandwellness@marietta.edu and Vicki Ford in HR (employees) at fordv@marietta.edu. 

While we do not require our undergraduate students or employees to get the vaccine, we expect everyone who is eligible to receive it and to get the booster. Please register for the vaccine or a booster today online. We are also looking at the possibility of hosting a booster clinic on campus, but we need to know how many students and employees would be willing to take advantage of this opportunity. Please fill out this online survey so we can get an idea if it will work. 

While we are not sending out emails announcing positive cases any longer, I did want to point out that we have five active cases and we will continue to update the COVID-19 Dashboard. 

I look forward to welcoming everyone back to campus, and if we all work together, we will enjoy another successful semester together. 

Bring Forth a Pioneer! 

Bill Ruud
President and Professor of Management