As stated in an article posted March 10th by the Washington Post, social distancing can buy valuable time against the coronavirus—it can "break potential chains of transmission by preventing sick people from coming in close contact with healthy ones, whether it means canceling conferences or relying on individual decisions to avoid crowded public transportation." While no student or faculty has been diagnosed with the virus (yet), many students at Cooper Union are commuters and thus must put themselves at risk of contracting the virus because they have to use public transportation to get to class. According to the same article, "'Whenever you see the virus, it’s moved on already—it will have infected other people by the time you become aware of it,' says Bill Hanage, an epidemiologist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health." Nationwide, festivals and parades have been canceled, and locally, many colleges have already decided to close their campuses to slow the spread of the virus. It is irresponsible and dangerous, especially for students and faculty with autoimmune diseases or those who are elderly or live with elderly folks, for the administration of Cooper Union to not move to remote classes when the majority of colleges in downtown Manhattan have opted to do so. Please sign this petition if you believe Cooper Union should move to remote classes until further notice.