The Johns Hopkins Gazette: April 28, 2003
April 28, 2003
VOL. 32, NO. 32

  

SAIS Ends Semester Early at Nanjing Center

International students and faculty to leave China as precaution against SARS

By Felissa Neuringer Klubes
SAIS

Johns Hopkins Gazette Online Edition

The Nitze School of Advanced International Studies and Nanjing University agreed last week to end the spring 2003 semester at the Hopkins-Nanjing Center for Chinese and American Studies in Nanjing, China, as a precaution against severe acute respiratory syndrome.

There have been no cases of SARS reported either at the center or in Nanjing, and the joint decision is strictly precautionary. The semester ended April 22, and students are being asked to leave the center by Tuesday, April 29. International faculty and research fellows have been asked to leave by Tuesday, May 6. The semester was scheduled to end on June 6. Because a substantial part of the yearlong program had been completed, students will receive the certificates for which they had been studying.

After closely monitoring the situation for several weeks, a final joint decision was made to curtail the spring semester primarily out of concern for the health of the international and Chinese students, faculty, research fellows and staff. Because not enough is known about SARS at this time, the university said it believed it was prudent to end the semester early.

Johns Hopkins and Nanjing University expect the center to resume its operations at the start of the 2003-2004 academic year in September and strongly reiterated their long-standing commitment to their partnership. A final determination about the upcoming academic year will be made by mid-summer.

Established in 1986, the center is an educational joint venture between Johns Hopkins and Nanjing universities. It gives approximately 100 students from the United States, China and other countries the opportunity to live together and pursue graduate-level studies for one year. SAIS administers the center's activities on behalf of JHU.


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