COVID-19 and the Open Life Science Program

Like many other organisations, we’ll be posting a few short recommendations in light of the COVID-19 outbreak, sharing advice for people participating in our program and ways we can act to minimise difficulties over the next few months.

Since OLS is an online program, it won’t be directly affected by the COVID-19 outbreak. That said, our participants are from all around the world, including countries that are either already severely affected or are in a state of emergency to act as COVID-19 spreads around the world. Even if your country is not yet locked down, we presume that you are practicing social distancing and may be even working remotely from home already.

Our cohort calls and mentor calls - at this point in time - will go ahead as scheduled with the following recommendations and contingency plans:

Q 1: What happens to the participants who need to take a break due to their illness or carer responsibilities?

• A 1: If you are able to, please inform us as soon as possible - but we appreciate that things may not be that simple if you have your hands full dealing with the situation. Being absent from calls due to pandemic-related concerns will not result in you being removed from the program.

Q 2: What happens to the mentors/experts who need to take a break due to their illness or carer responsibilities?

• A 2: If you can, please inform us as soon as possible. If a mentor is unwell or has other circumstances preventing them from attending mentorship calls, we will attempt to arrange a second mentor to help out. If you are an expert who has agreed to talk but is unable to, letting us know as early as you can allow us time to arrange a replacement speaker.

Q 3: Will the program be extended if we are unable to participate?

• A 3: We will hold our cohort calls and share notes and the recording from those calls as scheduled. However, the 1:1 mentor calls can be agreed between the mentor-mentee pair/groups and can take place with a few weeks delay when needed. We will check-in with all our participants regularly to see how they are getting on.
  • Mentees who need to take a break (see Q 3), we will hold a second slot for their final presentations, a later date for which will be agreed upon mutually. This will allow them to catch up with the cohort calls (notes and recording) and complete their assignments.
  • Mentors who need to take a break should let us know on Gitter or by email as soon as possible so that one of the organisers or other volunteer mentors can step in to support your mentees in your absence.

We hope that you have already informed yourself about the current COVID-19 pandemic situation and taking responsible steps towards the well-being of yourself, your family, and society in general. Here is a document from The World Health Organisation with comprehensive information about the current situation with recommendation and advice for the public regarding COVID-19.

Looking for some lighter or more productive uses of your time? We have a shortlist of links you might want to check out:

• Donate spare CPU cycles to help find possible protein folding permutations: Coronavirus – What we’re doing and how you can help in simple terms
• Join the virtual COVID-19 Biohackathon, April 5-11
• Check out the Kaggle space for R users: Novel Corona Virus dataset
• Visualise Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) – Statistics and Research by our world in data

In case of any concern - please contact us on team@we-are-ols.org with any queries or worries - no question too small!

Stay safe and wash your hands, folks! (and stop touching your face!!)

Cover image on Unsplash by Kelly Sikkema