Solano Community College shut down its Fairfield campus Monday, Oct. 19, after what the school called an unforeseen power outage knocked out in-person classes and business operations for the day. Only facilities staff and deans were told to report to the Suisun Valley Road campus, leaving students and faculty to wait for word on when normal operations would return.
The college announced the closure citing the unexpected outage, according to KRON4. All in-person classes were canceled for the day, and the campus's business offices closed as well, the station reported. Students were advised to check their Solano email and Canvas portal for updates from professors, according to CBS Sacramento.
Early College High School Stayed Open
While the broader campus went dark for the day, Early College High School was scheduled to remain open throughout the closure, per the same KRON4 report. The program, hosted at the Fairfield campus under the umbrella of Rodriguez High School, lets students earn Solano Community College credit while working toward their high school diploma, according to Fairfield-Suisun Unified School District. Under the program, students take their high school and college coursework concurrently, right on the community college campus, the district notes.
School officials said they would give students an update on the power situation by 3 p.m. Monday, the station reported. As of the closure announcement, the college had not confirmed whether in-person classes would resume Tuesday, per the same KRON4 account.
Not Tied to Last Week's Planned Shutoffs
The outage did not appear to be connected to Public Safety Power Shutoffs announced the previous Thursday, which affected only 30 customers in Solano County, the station reported. That distinction matters for a campus that has dealt with unplanned disruptions before — the Fairfield campus was separately closed on a Thursday due to a water outage after it lost its city-supplied water, according to KCRA. That earlier incident also forced the cancellation of in-person classes and a planned on-campus Kendrick Lamar dance that would have included the college president, KCRA reported at the time. Nothing in the available reporting ties Monday's power outage to that earlier water disruption.
