MORRIS COUNTY — County College of Morris (CCM) is providing students with a number of options for how they can take their courses this Fall Semester so they can keep moving forward with their higher education.

The college currently is enrolling students for the fall and has built-in a high level of flexibility to make it easier for them to pursue their goals during these challenging times. It also is implementing a number of health and safety measures, as per federal, state and local guidelines, to protect the well-being of the campus community.

Students enrolling this fall will be able to select courses that are being offered in one of three formats: hybrid, online, and remote.

Hybrid Courses consist of a combination of traditional face-to-face instruction and remote or online sessions. This may include some on-campus labs with remote lectures, reduced in-classroom time, or other instructional designs that meet the needs of the course materials.

Online Courses were designed to be taught in an online setting. Unless otherwise noted, online courses were developed to be taught without specific meeting times.

Remote Courses were designed to be taught in a classroom but are being offered as a form of distance education due to the emergency conditions. Remote classes are completely online but include scheduled virtual meeting times when the class is to meet together.

To limit the number of people on campus, the majority of classes are being offered in the online and remote formats.

Students enrolling this fall also can select from a number of terms, ranging from 2 weeks to 15-week sessions. Students can search for courses and the format they prefer by clicking here.  Use the Advanced Search feature to select one of the terms being offered this fall:

• 15 Week – September 9 – December 22
• Early Start 2 Week – September 9 – September 22
• Early Finish 7 Week – September 9 – October 27
• Mid Start 2 Week – September 23 – October 6
• 13 Week – September 23 – December 22
• Late Start 2 Week – October 7 – October 20
• Late Start 7 – November 4 – December 22

New students first need to apply to the college before registering for classes. Applications can be submitted by clicking here. Continuing students should talk with their advisor before registering.

Support Services Designed for Student Success
When the COVID-19 pandemic first struck New Jersey, CCM moved its support services online so students could continue to gain assistance to ensure their success. The Academic Success Center was expanded into TascPlus@ccm.edu to provide students with individualized online assistance from updating them on the status of classes, connecting them to a student success specialist or a counselor, to arranging for them to pick up any class materials or technology they may need. Included among the other services the college is offering online are Academic Advisement, Tutoring, and Live Chats with Librarians. To learn more about those services click here.

An Education You Can Afford
Each year, CCM awards approximately $12 million in financial aid and scholarships to its students, allowing them to pursue a high-quality college education at an affordable price. To find out more click here.   All its classes, hybrid, online and remote, are offered at a fraction of the cost of most other online offerings.

Transfer or Gain Employment Upon Graduation
At CCM, students can choose from 50 academic degrees and a wide range of certificate programs. A number of programs, such as those in computer science, engineering, and hospitality and culinary science, are designed so students can seek employment immediately upon graduation. Numerous others are specifically designed so students can transfer their credits to earn a bachelor’s degree. CCM holds more than 125 agreements with colleges and universities across New Jersey and the nation to simplify the transfer process. A listing of those agreements can be found by clicking here.

MORRIS COUNTY — New Jersey on Friday announced 20 more deaths attributed to the coronavirus and 202 more positive cases, while the state’s rate of transmission — a key metric officials are using to measure the virus’ spread and determine how to lift restrictions — increased again, to 1.11.“This means that each new positive case is leading to one more positive case,” Gov. Phil Murphy said during his latest coronavirus in Trenton. “We need to get Rt back down, to where we are actively slowing the rate of spread of this virus.”The Garden State has reported 15,684 total deaths related to COVID-19 — 13,710 confirm…

MORRIS COUNTY — The N.J. Department of Labor said it has started paying 20 weeks of additional unemployment benefits to those who exhausted their payments. Before the extension, workers would receive 26 weeks of regular benefits and then 13 weeks more from a federal extension under the coronavirus relief law, the CARES Act. Benefits maxed out at 39 weeks. The extra 20 weeks, bringing the total to 59 weeks, was a great relief to workers, but some have reported this week that they haven’t seen the extensions. The Labor Department said every eligible claimant will be automatically enrolled in the extended benefits …

MORRIS COUNTY — Senator Joe Pennacchio slammed the Democrat-sponsored $10 billion borrowing scheme that could cost New Jersey taxpayers tens of billions of dollars throughout the next four decades:

“It is the definition of insanity to blindly approve borrowing $10 billion when the executive branch has not even proposed a budget yet for next year and we have no clue how much we will actually need. We also shouldn’t forget that Governor Murphy has been sitting on $2 billion of unspent federal funds from the CARES Act for months.

“The governor’s borrowing scheme includes $2.7 billion to fund shortfalls that he says exists in the current fiscal year. That frankly does not make any sense. He recently signed a balanced budget extension bill that will get our State through the end of the fiscal year in September, claiming we’ll end the year with a $1 billion surplus.

“It’s increasingly clear that this borrowing scheme is not about actual fiscal need, it’s about giving Governor Murphy a $10 billion slush fund that our grandchildren will be stuck repaying for a generation.”

Our photographers and videographers are no strangers to calamity.They ran as the Twin Towers collapsed, waded through flooded streets to capture Hurricane Sandy’s devastation, and documented the emotional tension in numerous courtrooms.But chronicling the coronavirus pandemic has been different.“This one, it’s like an invisible terrorist in a way and it’s ongoing,” said Patti Sapone, who first began working as a photojournalist for The Star-Ledger about 29 years ago. “It’s like day after day after day. You think: When is the healing going to start? When is this going to end?”Sapone is the lead…

As school districts prepare to release their reopening plans to parents, some New Jersey teachers are reeling at the thought of reentering classrooms and expressing serious concern for their wellbeing and that of their families and students.A national survey by the country’s second largest teachers’ union, the American Federation of Teachers, indicates that 3 in 4 teachers said they are comfortable returning to schools if certain safety precautions are met. But whether safety and health precautions can be guaranteed is another question.“I think almost all educators want to go back, if it can b…

MORRIS COUNTY — For over a week, the chaotic reopening of state motor vehicle agencies has required local police to help manage crowds lining up for service overnight after the agency was shut down for almost four months.

“Murphy and the MVC had months to prepare for this, but now towns are forced to take matters into their own hands,” said Assemblywoman Aura Dunn (R-Morris). “They should not have to bear the costs to deal with the problems Governor Murphy and the MVC created.”

Dunn, Assemblyman Kevin Rooney, and Assemblywoman Serena DiMaso have introduced bills to mitigate backlogs, and are now calling on the Murphy administration to reimburse towns for having to respond to the large crowds building around the 39 agencies across the state.

Mayors have also chimed in about the lack of preparation by the administration.

“Our police spent the better part of several days directing the traffic that backed up onto Route 10 to help with crowd control and other issues that came up among the hundreds of people waiting in line,” explained Randolph Mayor Christine Carey. “The MVC was not prepared to handle the crowds as they reopened.”

The process has also been particularly hard on residents.  Last week, when agencies reopened on July 7, drivers reported lines and waits for multiple hours in the sun and heat. Some had to make multiple trips costing time, vacation days, and time-off from work.

“All of this frustration and anger could have easily been avoided if the administration had just listened to the calls we were getting from our constituents,” said Rooney (R-Bergen). “This is about getting people back to work and providing for their families. We have to take action now if we are going to fix this problem sooner rather than later.”

The three lawmakers also offered several creative alternatives to alleviate the demand, such as allowing private buyers to handle the titling of their vehicles with car dealers for a fee and allowing third-party testing, including driving schools, to relieve the backlog of new drivers waiting for their road test.

“Private businesses, like car dealerships and driving schools, were willing to jump in,” explained DiMaso (R-Monmouth). “Governor Murphy had months to figure this out, but now local police have to manage the crowds and the traffic created by doing nothing.”

The Republicans introduced their ideas as legislation at the end of June as A4326, A4327, and A4306, which are currently in the Assembly Transportation Committee.