Sacramento State University’s Faculty Senate voted in favor of keeping spring break next semester amid concerns of COVID-19 and students coming to campus after traveling.

The senators were presented with three options by the Division of Student Affairs: keeping traditional spring break, having a mini spring break or having no spring break. The status quo was the most popular option with 54 senators voting for no change to spring break, none in favor of a mini spring break and one in favor of no break. 

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Many of the senators agreed that changing the semester even more and taking away an important break that provides students and faculty time to recover mentally from their workload would be ill-advised. 

“A lot of people in my department are worried about the continued uncontrollable changes that students are dealing with,” said senator Rebecca Cameron, who represents the psychology department. “Not having a spring break is a terrible idea for people’s mental health.” 

Provost and Vice President of Academic Affairs Steve Perez attended the meeting and said the Office of Academic Affairs will take the senators’ feedback into consideration when deciding what the best option will be next semester. 

“The concern with spring break is two-fold,” Perez said. “Campuses that have had people on campus getting sick, going home for breaks and taking the virus home with them, or bringing it back to campus.” 

Perez said that the idea to have a mini spring break or no break at all came as a result of predictions from an expert that gave a presentation to the UC Board of Regents that show a COVID-19 spike for the next eight weeks. 

“Nobody wants to do any of these things,” Perez said. “The only reason we’re even thinking about it is because of the health experts and what they’re predicting in terms of the virus.”