CORONA INFORMATION

2020.03.15 | Damian A. Hertoft Goldberg

Dear PhD Student at Graduate School of Health,

The situation regarding The outbreak of coronavirus (COVID-19) is escalating, and new safety measures are taken by Danish Authorities on a daily basis.

The Danish Health Authority recommends that educational institutions should be particularly vigilant.

Aarhus University encourages all students, employees and guests to take care of themselves and to show consideration for their surroundings.

AU is monitoring the situation and is regularly updating information about the coronavirus outbreak on the website: www.au.dk/en/corona.

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Travels
Aarhus University strongly advises against any travelling abroad.
We want to encourage PhD students abroad to carefully consider their situation.

All PhD Students must stay informed via the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark’s guidelines for travel abroad.

Special circumstances may apply for international PhD students travelling to or from Denmark. Please keep yourself updated on the International Academic Staff Service (IAS) website.

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PhD defences:
In cases where it is possible and relatively unproblematic to postpone PhD defences scheduled to be held before March 27, this will be done. The PhD and Talent administration has already been in contact with most of you regarding this issue.

In order to ensure that the activities of the Graduate Schools at Aarhus University can continue best as possible during the physical shutdown of Aarhus University, the University management has decided that PhD defences, in very special circumstances can be conducted digitally during this period.

If your PhD defence is scheduled before March 27, you and your supervisor will be contacted by the PhD and Talent administration in order to postpone your defence or in very special circumstances to make the preparations to conduct the PhD defence digitally.

Please await for the PhD and Talent administration to contact you.

We are currently testing deferent IT platforms to ensure the best possible solution.

More information will follow in a couple days on the Graduate School website.

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PhD courses:
PhD courses scheduled to be held before March 27 will in general be cancelled or postponed.

We are working hard to prepare digital solutions in order to offer distance learning. We are currently testing the technology and expect to be able to offer distance learning on some PhD courses.

The university has never before had to apply this technology on such a large scale. Therefore, we ask for your patience.

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Qualifying exams (for flexible/integrated PhD enrolled at Nat or Tech):
Some PhD Students have scheduled Qualifying exams before March 27. As far as possible, all exams will be rescheduled for when the university is no longer closed.

In the rare cases where rescheduling is impossible, the exams can be conducted digitally during this period. In this case, you will need a written acceptance from the head of the graduate school.

Please find more information regarding educational activities on the AU website: medarbejdere.au.dk/en/corona/faq-and-chat-for-students/

Best regards,

Helene Nørrelund
Head of the Graduate School of Health

Damian A. Hertoft Goldberg
Head of the PhD and Talent administration at Health,
Natural Sciences and Technical Sciences