As many schools get back to normal during the COVID-19 pandemic with a mix of in-person and virtual learning Yakima Valley College is staying online. Officials at the local college say YVC will continue to offer students online classes through the 2021 fall quarter.

YVC President Linda Kaminski says “this is a decision that needs to be made now in order to complete the development of YVC’s course schedule for the fall, offer advising to our students and provide adequate time for our entire campus community to plan while we look forward to resuming regular operations, our campus community has displayed tremendous resilience during this pandemic and I know that will continue.”

Why continue with virtual learning while other schools around the state are opening and while state health officials urge to open schools? Yakima Valley College officials say the decision to continue mostly virtual learning is based on the state’s restrictions for institutions of higher education and the need to continue efforts to safeguard the health and safety of YVC employees and students.

So that means the Yakima Valley College campus remains closed to the public with no in-person events planned and all services online. School officials say decisions for winter quarter 2022 operations will be made at a future date.

Other schools in the valley and the state are making individual decisions for students in public schools. Private schools in the Yakima area, including Riverside Christian School have been open since last year with no reported problems or major outbreaks of COVID-19.

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