Campus responds to Hurricane Katrina

September 1, 2005

We all have seen the suffering and devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina, and our hearts go out to the victims and their families.

The hurricane left thousands of college students without schools and homes. The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is one of a large number of institutions across the nation working to assist these students.

If you are contacted by a student or parent regarding the possibility of late admission because of the hurricane, please suggest that they contact the Office of Admissions and Records at 217/333-0302. For financial aid assistance, please refer callers to 217/333-0100.

We are able to accommodate up to 40 students and have already received our first one, who will be on campus this weekend and will start classes next Tuesday. For students who cannot come to Urbana, but want to continue their studies this fall, we are exploring ways to connect them to our Guided Individual Study courses.

Additionally, we are working with the Champaign County Red Cross to collect donations for all hurricane victims. You can contribute Saturday, September 3rd and September 10th, at Memorial Stadium before the football games. Volunteers also will be on campus Wednesday, September 7th, and Thursday, September 8th, at the entrances to the following locations:

The Quad

the Physical Plant

Grainger Library

Wohler's Hall

and the Veterinary Medicine Basic Sciences Building.

We also are exploring ways to accommodate displaced faculty and graduate students, and we are sharing our engineering and planning expertise through the Federal Emergency Management Agency and other response agencies.

There will be other steps we take as a campus to assist those who so desperately need our help, but these are things that we can do immediately. Thank you for your generosity.

Sincerely,

Richard Herman
Chancellor