Middle States’ leadership and volunteer management teams are closely monitoring the current coronavirus global health emergency. We are regularly consulting guidelines issued by local government agencies and leading health authorities including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the World Health Organization (WHO).
The health and safety of our volunteers and school communities is our first priority. To that end, we have made the difficult decision to postpone visits to schools or regions where there is a heightened risk of infection. We will work closely with each of these schools to reschedule team visits as soon as the situation warrants.
At this stage, in consultation with all involved schools, the majority of accreditation visit activities outside of the United States have been postponed for the next four weeks. Domestic U.S. visits are being assessed on a case-by-case basis, as the situation evolves. We are reaching out directly to all schools scheduled to host visits this month as well as each volunteer participating on an accreditation visit to determine the best path forward.
We are continuing to assess this evolving situation and will provide updates as necessary.
We know MSA accredited schools across the country and around the world, as well as our own office, are working hard to develop and/or implement emergency plans for this rapidly evolving situation. We are proud of the resilience many of our schools are demonstrating as they shift to online learning in the wake of school closures. To that end, we will be sharing and updating suggested online learning resources from our member schools on our website here.
