After a summer of uncertainty, the University has finally confirmed that classes will resume ‘in-person’ this semester. Praise the Lord with us! The administrators of the University waited until two weeks before the scheduled resumption of classes to make this announcement, which obviously made planning for the EU very difficult. EU students and staff alike are very excited about the prospect of returning to campus.

However, life on campus will no longer be as it was. The University has announced that in-person lectures of more than 120 students will no longer occur; they will be offered online instead. Like many, you may have memories of lecture theatres full with 400+ students in Wallace or Eastern Ave or Carslaw. To quote the Vice- Chancellor, Mark Scott, ‘Those days are gone.’ Notably, this is not a mere COVID-related change. The University has observed students’ declining in-person attendance at lectures over many years. COVID has afforded them the opportunity to move away from large, in-person lectures and towards recorded lectures with in-person tutorials and seminars.

Hopefully, the EU, as God’s people committed to gathering in love for one another around his Word, may stand out on a relationally disconnected campus.

Leaving aside the educational pros-and-cons of this change, it will have significant, permanent impact on the way EU operates. Students will be on-campus less, making it more difficult to find times to gather them together. EU Public Meetings may need to be ‘capped’ at 120 attendees. Even the experience of gathering with 100+ other students for lecture-style content may be foreign for many. As well as challenges, this change opens up new possibilities for the EU ministry. The experience of community will be even more rare on campus. Hopefully, the EU, as God’s people committed to gathering in love for one another around his Word, may stand out on a relationally disconnected campus. ‘By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another’ (Jn 13.35). Pray that God may bless our gatherings on campus and that he might use them to reach the thousands of lost students and staff at USyd in 2022.

Joyfully in his service,

Rowan Kemp

EU Staff Team Leader & EU GradsFund CEO