The coronavirus is spreading more rapidly than ever before on Tufts’ campus, forcing hundreds of students and some professors back into their bedrooms and onto the Zoom screen in a routine that’s become all too familiar after two years of pandemic learning.
The city of Somerville partnered with Fenway Health in March to prepare for the opening of a supervised consumption site where people who use drugs can consume drugs in a safe environment under medical supervision to prevent overdoses. Somerville signed a $40,000 contract with the healthcare and research organization — which caters specifically to people in the LGBT community, people of color and other underserved communities — to determine optimal locations for the supervised consumption site, establish a community advisory board and study existing models of drug use monitoring to determine how the site should operate.
Taina McField was appointed the new associate dean for strategy at the Jonathan M. Tisch College of Civic Life this month, the university announced in a statement.
The Tufts Community Union Senate Education Committee held a resources fair on April 6 to educate students about the resources and organizations available to help them with academic work, keep them safe and enhance student life on campus.
The psychology department hosted its second annual Psychology of Anti-Racism Series talk titled, “What We Learn From Where We Live,” on April 15. The Zoom webinar featured Dr. Neil Lewis Jr., an assistant professor of communication and social behavior at Cornell University, who spoke about how to foster an anti-racist society by understanding the connection between people and the places in which they live.
The Tufts Community Union Senate heard supplementary funding and capital expenditure requests and voted on resolutions about the presidential search committee and student mental health on Sunday night in the Sophia Gordon Multipurpose Room. The meeting was the body’s last of the semester.
Jana Dia has never been to the United States before, but she knows she wants one of her first stops to be Medford, Mass.
For the first time in three years, the Office of Undergraduate Admissions will welcome thousands of high school seniors to campus this month for a batch of rebranded Jumbo Days — known as ‘Bo Days — in hopes of offering members of the admitted class a glimpse into life at Tufts. In-person events, divided across six days, will supplement a month-long supply of virtual programming for admitted students, a remnant of the pandemic.
Tufts will transition to a “hybrid” model of arming its university police department based on the recommendations of the Working Group on TUPD Arming, according to a March 29 message to the Tufts community from Executive Vice President and WGTA Chair Mike Howard. The working group recommended that authorities transition to a hybrid model of arming that specializes the response to the nature of the call.
Tufts announced on April 8 that it will open a new Center for Black Maternal Health and Reproductive Justice (CBMHRJ) within the School of Medicine. Dr. Ndidiamaka Amutah-Onukagha, the Julia A. Okoro professor of Black Maternal Health at the Tufts University School of Medicine, will direct the center.
The Somerville City Council passed an ordinance on March 24 banning crisis pregnancy centers, defining them as deceptive, limited services pregnancy centers that do not directly provide or refer clients for abortions or emergency contraception.
Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley announced last month that she had secured $8 million of federal funding for the Massachusetts 7th Congressional District, which she represents, and that $2.5 million of that funding will be allocated for a Somerville project called the Poplar Street Pump Station. The project is slated to begin construction in fall 2022 and will provide critical stormwater management infrastructure to the city.
Tufts announced revised COVID-19 isolation procedures in an email to the university-wide community on April 13 as The Mods and hotel rooms used for isolation neared capacity.
Tufts University Executive Vice President Mike Howard discussed divestment from Russian securities — which currently amount to $5.7 million out of the approximately $2.5 billion in Tufts’ endowment — at a special session of the University Faculty Senate on March 23. Howard said that fully divesting from these securities would be “too risky for the endowment,” but that the university is working with its investment managers, who are seeking to minimize their funds’ exposure to Russian money.
U.S. Congressman and Tufts alumnus Peter DeFazio, D-Ore, spoke about his work as the chair of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and his time in Congress with Professor and Chair of the Department of Political Science Deborah Schildkraut as part of the Tisch College Solomont Speaker Series. DeFazio (A’69) has represented Oregon’s 4th Congressional District for 36 years and plans to retire at the end of his current term. Although originally scheduled to speak at Tufts in person, DeFazio joined the event via Zoom from his office because he recently tested positive for the COVID-19 virus.
The Tufts Community Union Senate held their annual Budget Day — allocating $2,608,225 to over 200 student organizations for the 2023 fiscal year — and heard two resolutions in a meeting on Sunday night in the Sophia Gordon Multipurpose Room.
COVID-19 cases have increased on the Medford/Somerville campus following students’ return from spring break. The University reported 28 new cases on Saturday and 68 the day before. This marks the second time Tufts has reached the highest recorded number of cases in a day. The average number of COVID-19 cases in a day increased by around 10% in the past week, with an average of 29 students testing positive each day in the week before Saturday.
Temporary housing at the current site of The Mods will be used to house 150 first-year students in fall 2022, Dean of Student Affairs Camille Lizarríbar informed the Tufts community in an April 8 email. Construction of three separate buildings, which will house 50 students and three resident assistants each, will begin once the university’s plan is approved by the City of Somerville.
Local activists and some elected officials have criticized a recent study of Somerville Police Department’s staffing. The City of Somerville announced on March 8 that its Racial and Social Justice Department had contracted a consulting firm to conduct a study on the Somerville Police Department’s staffing procedures, prompting frustration over the speed of police reform in Somerville.
The Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) at the Jonathan M. Tisch College of Civic Life recently released a report titled “Youth Concern About Climate Change Drives Civic Engagement.”
