Carleton released a statement on the downtown and Parliament shootings Oct. 22 at noon, around two hours after police were first called to the crime scene at the War Memorial.
The statement said classes would continue as scheduled, but students who were downtown and planning to come to campus were exempt from classes. There were no penalties for missing a mid-term, according to Beth Gorham, the manager of public affairs at the university.
She said the university wanted to “reassure its faculty, staff and students that while the university is open, there will be no repercussions to not travelling to campus from downtown today.”
“Carleton began tweeting official police word about the shootings immediately,” she said.
Classes at the University of Ottawa were cancelled, according to the university’s official twitter feed. The downtown university was on lockdown and all midterms have been postponed.
Carleton did not go into lockdown because “at this point, activity around the shootings is concentrated in the downtown core, quite a ways from the Carleton campus,” Gorham said.
She added that Campus Safety was monitoring the situation closely and would provide updates if there was any change.
The downtown lockdown, which included the University of Ottawa, followed a shooting at the War Memorial in downtown Ottawa where a gunman shot a soldier.
The gunman later fled to parliament hill where police shot him down. There are potentially more gunmen on the loose, according to Ottawa police.
Police activity was centred on the downtown area, according to Carleton’s statement. The RCMP advised people around parliament hill via Twitter.
The Carleton University Students’ Association (CUSA) also released a statement on their website.
“We ask that everyone be cognizant of the sensitivity of the incident and avoid sharing information from non-official channels,” the statement said.
CUSA added updates will be provided through University Communications as more information is available.
“Our thoughts are with all those affected,” the statement said.
