Dear all
I am writing to inform you that the Australian Government has from 5pm today suspended travel from mainland China to Australia for everyone except Australian citizens, residents and their families.
These changes will have a substantial impact for our community, especially for our students who have not yet arrived from mainland China. This will be very distressing for them, and we will work as a community to support them.
Temporary Travel Arrangements
- Foreign nationals (excluding permanent residents) who are in mainland China, will not be allowed to enter Australia for 14 days from the time they have left or transited through mainland China.
- Australian citizens, permanent residents and their families who do enter Australia and who have been in mainland China will be required to self-isolate for 14 days from the time they left mainland China.
- This directive applies to travellers from all of mainland China and not just Wuhan and Hubei province.
We have in place arrangements to support our residential students who need to self-isolate as per the Government's directive.
For our students still in China, we are committed to making you feel welcome even as you wait to be able to travel and will work to make sure can you continue your studies with as little disruption as possible. We will be directly in contact with you.
As a university community, we will do all we can to minimise the disruption in supporting our affected students to progress their academic pursuits while they are off campus. We will need to be nimble, creative, and empathetic to achieve this, and I look forward to working with all to achieve this.
This is disappointing for the entire ANU community. We were all looking forward to welcoming such an important and vibrant part of our community back to campus.
We also need to be conscious that this is a difficult time for many of our students who have already arrived.
The University will be generous and flexible in supporting our students, and our staff, through this challenge.
We also ask that you all do the same. We as a community must show the same empathy, care and support for our students affected by this situation as we have shown one another during what has been an extraordinary start to 2020. We must be kind to ourselves. We must be kind to others.
Simply put, viruses don't discriminate. And neither do we.
We are one community and we will meet this challenge together and support all those affected as one community - so that we can all get back to doing what we do best: studying, working and playing together as one ANU.
Regards
Brian
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