In January management decided staff, with approval, could work all-remotely until end March – no longer

It was part of the university’s COVID-19 response, but there’s a change. From Monday management will want staff on campus for 60 per cent of working hours.

Lectures will remain on-line, “with all other teaching, learning and research activities transitioning back to our previously established ‘Covid-safe’ face-to-face on-campus delivery modes,” by end February.

The new arrangements apply, “until state-wide requirements are further significantly modified.”

The announcement is an unsettling surprise for some, “very disconcerting for a number of vulnerable staff or those who care for vulnerable people,” one Uni SA person says.

However Vice Chancellor David Lloyd explains the early return to the office, telling staff the university is “cognisant” of the impact, “such sustained measures would have on commencing and returning domestic and international students and their Uni SA experience, particularly as we approach Orientation.”

Back to campus, he says is, “commensurate with our commitment to recognising the endemic nature of the virus, mirroring those enacted in the wider general community, and are central to us normalising our reaction to its occurrence in our population. We will continue to manage Covid-19 in accordance with all applicable health regulations and advice, and as we would any other communicable illness that may occur within a population as large and diverse as the university community.”