The University of California, Berkeley School of Law will remain fully online for the fall semester. Dean Erwin Chemerinsky informed students by email Friday of the decision, which he wrote was made with “great reflection and study.” That makes Berkeley the second law school to unveil plans to stay remote amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Harvard Law School made a similar announcement June 3. At that time, Berkeley was aiming to offer at least some in-person instruction though a hybrid model.
“Our top priority is protecting the health of our students, staff, and faculty,” Chemerinsky wrote in the June 26 announcement that the school will be fully online next semester. “At the same time, we want to do what is best educationally for our students.”
Chemerinsky acknowledged that many students lobbied for a return to campus instruction. The school evaluated numerous ways to try to offer at least some in-person classes in the fall, but ultimately the constraints posed by the coronavirus and university’s policies were too much to overcome. The campus policy allows for no more than 25 students in a classroom, and they must be six feet apart. Even small classes would have to meet in the school’s two large classrooms to meet the social distancing requirements, and faculty, staff and students would have to wear masks both inside out outside, Chemerinsky wrote. Even the law school’s ventilation system is cause for concern, he added...
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