COVID-19 Governance and Input Affairs Committee briefs Compliance Officers

COVID-19 Governance and Input Affairs Committee of St. Mary’s University briefed SMU Compliance Officers on November 04, 2020. The Dean of Student Support Services Office welcomed the self-motivated Compliance Officers, all of whom are students of SMU, and introduced the agendum and Ato Desalegn Berie, Chair of COVID-19 Governance and Input Affairs Committee and Vice President for Business and Administration, who made the briefing.

Appreciating students for accepting the University’s call and volunteering to serve as Compliance Officers during the face-to-face classes which will resume next week, Ato Desalegn Berie explained St. Mary’s University’s preparations toward resuming classes while ensuring adherence to COVID-19 prevention protocols.

According to him, different structures have been created to make effective and efficient response to the emerging needs and challenges caused by COVID-19. A University-wide taskforce, which is answerable to the University Senate, is tasked to lead the teaching learning activities while ensuring the health and safety of the University community. He said, “Working under this taskforce, there are three committees which have different foci.” Highlighting the core roles of the three committees, he elaborated on the specific duties and responsibilities of the Governance, Follow up and Input Affairs Committee, which he heads. He made it clear that an institutional guideline which clearly outlines the responsibilities of the taskforce and the committees working under it has been developed in light with the national guideline prepared to ward-off the the spread of COVID-19.

The major responsibility of Compliance Officers, according to Ato Desalegn is, to ensure that students conform to the COVID-19 prevention protocols in order to enable healthy environment during their stay on campus. He also described the procedures the Compliance Officers should follow while discharging their responsibilities. Finally, a coordinator was assigned on voluntary basis to help the Compliance Officers work as a strong team in a coordinated manner and enable timely exchange of information with pertinent offices of the University.