Summer Academic Programs—Uganda

Greetings to you all,

We know that you’re all following the news about Covid-19 around the world. The semester at Middlebury has been disrupted, to say the least, and all of us are wondering when life will return to normal.

We have remained hopeful that the current situation would not continue into the summer months. However, with the news reports and medical alerts coming from Uganda and the US State Department among other international agencies, we cannot make any kind of assurance that international travel will be possible next month. At this point, flights to and from Uganda are all suspended and public transport within Uganda has been limited. Unfortunately, we anticipate travel restrictions and the impact on public health are unlikely to improve soon.
 
Therefore, Middlebury has been forced to make a very difficult decision. As you may have seen in this morning’s message from the Office of the Provost, we will not run our course in Uganda this summer. This is extremely disappointing to us, but we simply are not confident that we can provide the academic experience we hoped for, given the uncertainty of this situation.

Looking forward, we very much hope to run this course in the future. We will keep your applications in our system should the College decide to offer this course next year. If you would like to withdraw your application for 2021, please let us know.

We sincerely thank all of you for your interest in this opportunity. We are keeping our host community in Mpambire in our thoughts, and we hope you are all keeping safe and healthy. Please do not hesitate to contact us with questions or concerns.

Best wishes,
 
Damascus Kafumbe, Associate Professor of Music
Catherine Pierattini, Coordinator of Special Programs