Dear Friends:
We hope you and yours are well and that your 2022 is off to a wonderful start.
We write to share with you information about our reunion planning. As you might imagine, planning to date has been challenging, complicated by the spread of the Omicron variant and associated COVID-19 restrictions.
Our guiding principle in our planning is to maximize alumni attendance while prioritizing the health and safety of our Yale community: alumni, students, faculty, and staff.
As you know, the Omicron variant has affected travel and protocols for everyone, and here on campus it has resulted in an alert upgrade from green to orange. For more, please see Yale’s COVID-19 page for the university’s policies, which currently restrict gatherings and campus visitors. We are working closely with Yale’s COVID Response Team to develop reunion plans based on what we hope will be Yale’s policies later this spring. We have also been conferring with our peer institutions who have faced and are facing the same challenges regarding their reunions.
Given the uncertainty, there is a lot we do not know. However, we anticipate the following COVID requirements for reunions:
- Reunion attendees will be required to show proof of vaccination, including boosters.
- Masks will be required indoors.
- There will be de-densification requirements resulting in capacity limitations on attendance at indoor reunion events and under the tents and some restrictions on aerosolizing activities (e.g., group singing, playing of brass or wind instruments).
These requirements have many implications. These range from centralizing the location for attendee check-in to limiting attendance in a way that prioritizes the attendance of your classmates to eliminating some traditional reunion-wide programs such as Friday’s welcome reception on Cross Campus and the Celebration of Yale Singing.
We have also made the very hard decision not to offer childcare (i.e., Camp Bulldog). We have been monitoring staffing shortages, including for daycare, and have concluded that we cannot guarantee staffing at Camp Bulldog while also providing the needed staffing for your class and reunion-wide programs. We know this will disappoint many of you, but it is a step we must take this year.
We anticipate having more clarity around the university’s policies at the end of February or early March. We have already shared with your reunion chairs many details about our planning; going forward, you will be hearing more from them and from us as we learn more.
We, like you, are focused on the most important aspect of reunions: being together in person. While the circumstances may impose some limitations, we are committed to and excited about providing you and your classmates the opportunity to gather on campus. We love reunions! Welcoming you to campus is a highlight of the year, and we will do everything we can to do so again this year, safely and responsibly.
Weili Cheng ’77
Executive Director
Jenny Chavira ’89
Deputy Executive Director
