5 coronavirus things: Michigan State, Notre Dame latest to ditch in-person classes

In this special edition of 5 Things, Food Management highlights five things you may have missed recently about developments regarding coronavirus and its impact on onsite dining.

Here’s your list for today:

The University of Notre Dame amped up its effort to slow a rash of COVID-19 cases with a series of new measures, including online classes and the closure of public spaces, for at least two weeks. The university’s president, The Rev. John Jenkins, announced the moves in a live-streamed address.

For the next two weeks, undergraduate students will meet online only. Off-campus students are not to come on campus, and gatherings are limited to no more than 10 people, Jenkins said. Dormitories will be limited to residents only.

Read more: Notre Dame moves to online classes, closes public spaces for 2 weeks to stop COVID-19 spike

Michigan State University is going online for the fall and is encouraging students to stay home, the school’s president has announced, as schools across the nation struggle to control coronavirus outbreaks. Classes had been scheduled to begin Sept. 2 on the school’s East Lansing campus.

The move to online learning is just for undergraduate students at the moment. The colleges of Law, Human Medicine, Nursing, Osteopathic Medicine, Veterinary Medicine and all graduate programs will receive details at a later time, according to the university.

Related:5 coronavirus things: University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill halts in-person classes

Read more: Michigan State says most classes will be online in the fall

Elior North America has announced the promotion of Keith Cullinan to the Charlotte-based culinary management company's chief operations officer.

Cullinan brings more than 40 years of experience within the foodservice management industry to the new role. He served most recently as president of Contract Food Services at Elior North America. Before joining Elior, Cullinan was senior vice president, Strategic Relations, for Chartwells Schools. From 1997 to 2013, he was president of Chartwells, where he expanded the business from $65M to $900M in managed volume through acquisitions and organic growth to become the market leader.

Read more: Elior North America Promotes Keith Cullinan to Chief Operations Officer

Epic Systems, whose headquarters dining operations were named FM’s B&I Innovator of the Year in 2019, will allow employees to work from home through at least the end of the year, according to an email sent to employees, reversing a previous mandate that workers should return to the office beginning this week despite the continued spread of the coronavirus in Dane County.

Related:Food hall in renovated historic Chicago hospital serves surrounding healthcare and biotech facilities

Epic will also monitor the number of people on its campus in Verona, Wisc., which is typically the workplace of nearly 10,000 employees, and limit use if needed, CEO Judy Faulkner wrote.

Epic had planned to call employees back to the office in phases starting this week with the final phase coming back to the campus at the end of September. Epic employees, who all spoke on the condition that their names not be printed, decried that decision, saying it threatened the safety of the community because the virus could spread between workers.

Read more: Epic Systems rescinds requirement for employees to return to office until 2021

During visits to see a friend at Lehigh Valley Hospital-Cedar Crest, Kathleen Walko Frey grew increasingly bothered that meals regularly were delayed or not delivered over the course of her friend’s monthlong stay. Nurses and aides were unable to help and equally frustrated, citing problems with the hospital’s new food vendor that took over in April.

Lehigh Valley Health Network switched food management companies in April and hired the company that managed its cleaning services—Compass One Healthcare—to also provide food service. Compass One’s food service division is Morrison Healthcare.

Cynthia Ordonez, who has worked in LVH-Cedar Crest’s kitchen for three years, said the new food management company lacks organization and that there has been a lot of worker turnover. Ordonez said the kitchen often gets calls from patients, some in tears, because their food never arrived.

Orders get lost or accidentally thrown out and food trays are held up by managers who are slow to check that meals follow dietary restrictions, she said.

Read more: At Lehigh Valley Hospital, patients are missing meals and resorting to eating snacks as network addresses food service problem

Bonus: Stories from the front lines: Virginia Tech chef revs up grab-and-go, gets set for this fall’s demands

Contact Mike Buzalka at [email protected]