Since the coronavirus outbreak began in January, Indiana University Bloomington has set up an emergency management center with people from different offices on campus to monitor developments and the spread of the virus closely.

IU has an executive policy group with over 30 people meetings every day to monitor the current situation and make contingency plans. They are working on international services, overseas study, health, and safety. IU Director of Media Relations, Chuck Carney said they have contingency plans and will monitor the development of the coronavirus 24 hours if IU would jump into another level of action.

The virus is spreading so quickly it stands to impact IU students and faculties, especially on overseas programs. Just this week, IU joined Purdue in canceling all overseas school-sponsored spring break trips. One of the programs already being affected due to the coronavirus outbreak is IU’s Chinese Flagship Program. There are 20 Chinese Flagship Program students scheduled to travel abroad this summer face who face uncertainty regarding their travel plans.

Since January, the coronavirus outbreak in China already has impacted some second-semester capstone Chinese Flagship program students. There are six students in Nanjing who had to return to the United State and self-quarantine off campus for 14 days. Although they can back to China to continue their abroad study, they have declined this opinion, because it will extend their program.

“We hope everything will go well and students can go to Taiwan or China,” said Yea-Fen Chen, the director of the Chinese Flagship Program. “I think the situation is different every day, it’s still developing.”

According to the Chinese Flagship Program website, Chinese Flagship Program students are required to complete a summer intensive program in mainland China or Taiwan, which covers one year of language instruction. However, the outbreak has affected these students who need to go abroad to China, which will disrupt their study plans and even extend their program.

“It will be hard for our Flagship students,” Chen said.

The Duke University summer language program to Beijing which IU Flagship students will attend has already canceled their program in Beijing, China. Chen said that studying abroad is the best choice for them because they can learn Chinese better, integrate into Chinese culture and communicate with Chinese in China. Thus, many Flagship students who had planned to go to Beijing are now trying to apply to the Taiwan program as a plan B because of coronavirus has not hit Taiwan as hard.

IU executive policy group is tracking the current state of the coronavirus every day to make the safety decisions for IU students, especially with the coming spring break travel season. IU has issued 7 public safety advisories about travel bans and prevention tips in the past month. Now, if students and faculty plan to travel in the spring break, IU asks them to fill out the traveler information form to help the IU public safety officials have a way to contact and offer advice for them. The public safety center has received over 400 responses from students and faculty.

Carney said they suggest students check out the coronavirus hotspot areas and confirm the plan for their break and overseas programs from the public safety and CDC website.

The Monroe county encourages people to make emergency plans just in case of a self-quarantine and store food and necessities reasonably. Being prepared instead of being panic.