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Spring is (almost) here! | March 2021

15 March 2021

March 15, 2021

Director’s Note

Here we are, one full year into the pandemic and (for many of us) still working remotely from home. With less than two weeks until the official start of spring, we are looking forward to longer days and warmer weather. This is a great time to consider grabbing your laptop and getting some work done outside while enjoying the sunshine!

Virtual events are very much still our reality for now and YC&E has been busy supporting our clients with all their virtual event needs. Are you hosting a virtual event soon? See below for more information on why working with an experienced event planner is essential to making your event a complete success.

Continue to embrace the silver linings. If you have any questions, please reach out to us anytime. We would love to hear from you!

Be well and stay safe,

Suzanne

Executive Director

Make your next virtual event exceptional

Planning a virtual event, regardless of size or duration, can be a daunting task. Enlisting the help of an event planner brings you peace of mind and ensures your event runs flawlessly.

Our team at Yale Conferences & Events is proficient in the virtual event landscape and is tuned in to current trends and best practices for delivering virtual events. We provide live event supoort to quickly resolve platform issues and collaborate with cross-functional stakeholders such as A/V, IT, etc.

Let our award-winning team manage every planning detail so you can focus on your content. We offer a wide range of services to fit every budget and event. Learn more.

Proud moments of 2021 (so far!)

The new year has brought our team much to be proud of! YC&E is honored to be nominated for three Association of Collegiate Conference & Events Directors-Intl Awards this year for: Outstanding Individual Achievement, Outstanding Institutional Achievement (long-term), and Session of the Year! Award nominees and recipients will be recognized at the ACCED-I 41st Virtual Annual Conference Awards & Recognition Celebration on Tuesday, March 23, 2021. Congratulations and best of luck to all nominees!

Megan Palluzzi, Program Manager, recently teamed up with the Nonprofit Communications Report to publish a very useful resource, “Tips for Hosting a Top-Notch Zoom Meeting”, for their January 2021 issue. To read Megan’s article, click here. Way to go, Megan!

The road to Spring semester 2021, by the numbers

Intersession housing

Over the past year we have, in partnership with many Yale units, undertaken the task of assisting Yale College with student housing and belongings amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Having helped moved students out in November 2020 at the end of the Fall semester, we quickly shifted focus to intersession housing. From November 21st to January 28th, we helped house 72 students on Old Campus between semesters. YC&E’s Connecticut Hall Office, the central hub for COVID-19 Isolation and Old Campus Housing Services, remained open every day during this period, except on Christmas and New Year’s Day. A BIG thank you to our hardworking and dedicated staff at CT Hall!

Student move-in

It seems that as quickly as we said goodbye to students at the end of November, we were welcoming many of them back to campus once again. YC&E assisted with the move-in of approximately 1,805 students for the Spring semester, staffing both on-site and virtually to provide oversight to the moving team and college staff. The Connecticut Hall Office remained open 24/7 to support and accommodate late arrivals during the entire move-in process, while also managing student isolation housing for the university (156 students housed in isolation since the start of the academic year).

As you probably gathered from the information above, YC&E’s Connecticut Hall Office has been essential to many of the projects our department has undertaken for the university this past year. We recently interviewed (via Zoom) CT Hall Office Manager Maen Adileh to gget the inside scoop on what it has been like to operate a 24/7 housing and support office from Yale’s Old Campus during a global pandemic. Read more below!

Inside the CT Hall office: Making isolation housing feel a little less isolating

The COVID-19 Housing Office has been operating sevent days per week (8am to 10:30pm) since March 2020, with office staff working on-call shifts from 10:30pm to 8am. The office is responsible for housing students who test positive for COVID-19.

We began our interview with CT Hall Office Manager Maen Adileh telling us about the fast-paced nature of the office. He explains that, often, they need to house multiple students at once and make sure students do not cross paths while also assisting each in a timely fashion. While they normally get a notification to expect a student about an hour before they arrive, sometimes, he says, they have less than 10 minutes to get everything in place for a student. This means, making sure students have all the supplies that they need, including health kits, food from Yale Dining that meet any dietary needs the student has, and any other special requests. All of this is done while ensuring that everyone involved is complying with the Yale, EHS, and CDC COVID-19 safety guidelines, including safe drop-off of supplies and cleaning protocols.Newer measures have been adopted to aid in the effort to make students feel comfortable and a little less “isolated” in isolation housing. A special delivery table was added outside on Old Campus for students who want to order food from a local New Haven spot. The office staff has a system for coordinating these deliveries that they share with the students in housing. The office staff meets deliveries at Phelps Gate, drops food off at the delivery table, and lets the student know their food has arrived after they get back to CT Hall so that delivery is 100% contactless for the student. One example of a simple process and gesture to allow students the comfort of familiar New Haven food while having to isolate.

Maen says, “We try our best to make the students feel that they are welcomed and that we are able to assist them in any way they need. We are always happy to go the extra mile.” When talking about the procedures YC&E has adopted Maen adds, “YC&E, in general, did a great job coordinating different aspects of this complicated process, especially in times of need. They stayed on top of everything and made sure that we had protocols to ensure the safety of Yale students as well as members of our team, here, at the office throughout the entire pandemic.” Maen recounts that, in the beginning, living with the uncertainty of the pandemic was one of the hardest parts of running this office.

The housing office has also managed to stay open during all types of inclement weather so they could continue to provide students in isolation with the support they need to recover. On the one day the office had to close early due to a snow storm, the office closed at noon with guidance from Yale Health and Maen personally stayed until a last-minute student was able to make it through the snow to check-in.

Maen added that since this office is one of the very few open around the clock on Yale’s campus, they often get phone calls from students that are not related to isolation housing. Due to this, all office staff are prepared to offer any assistance they can in any situation.

Along with being a landing pad for many student questions, Maen and I discussed that these staff members are typically some of the first persons a student will talk to after they learn that they tested positive for COVID-19. Often, they speak with this team before they get to talk to their parents and that role is significant. After a discussion with the amazing Yale Health staff, the CT Hall team will call the student to explain the housing process. An email with instructions is also sent but a call is much more comforting, Maen notes. He recalls that a lot of times, the students are overwhelmed and hearing someone explain the process to them over the phone can be much more reassuring and less confusing. “We try our best to comfort them and let them know that they will be taken care of,” Maen adds.

“Being able to serve the Yale and New Haven community is rewarding,” Maen explains, “The ability to help in whatever capacity during such unprecedented times is a privilege and pleasure.” He shared that so many students have left them “Thank You” notes in their room after they leave isolation housing. When the office staff gets them, they read them together and put them up on a dedicated wall they created in CT Hall. Maen got emotional when adding, “The phone calls we get from parents to thank us literally make our day and motivate us to do our best to continue what we started and to fulfill our commitment to the community.”

While we hope this type of office is never needed again, we are so grateful for the work and the support the Connecticut Hall Office staff has given to Yale students and first-responders. When it comes to something like isolation housing, it becomes clear that it is still imperative to rely on human connection and team efforts.

Stay in Touch

We would love to hear how you are doing and what you thought about our March 2021 newsletter. What would you like to see featured in our future newsletters? Send us a message.

For the most up-to-date information, be sure to follow our social media accounts. We will be sharing important University updates, helpful information on housing meetings, and the latest on Connecticut’s COVID-19 response.