School in the 2020-2021 Academic Year & Coronavirus (Part 1)

Parents Forum
4682

Many of the Canadian schools have a greater % of off campus housing, and charge significantly less tuition than most US schools, making money less of a factor when deciding whether or not schools should go online.

Trying not to get too political here, but the leadership in Canada has deferred to the experts more than they have down here. It’s pretty hard to be in Covid denial when your spouse(Sophie Trudeau) has tested positive, or your MIL (Ontario Premier Ford)is trapped in a LTC facility with an outbreak.

4683

Because this virus is highly contagious. Protocols don’t necessarily keep people from getting sick. They just limit the spread.

4684

That right there is the crux of the matter.

4685

Good. I hope more schools announce this as a policy - and then follow through.

4686

If I were you, I would try to get information about how Calc teachers at your local cc are approaching their online classes. Some may be great, but not others. For example, my D21’s Multivariable professor this semester gives them 5 minute videos for each class (2 classes per week) and just assigns reading and homework. Exams are unproctored. He does not hold office hours but answers emails for questions and may take a day or two to respond. The result is that my D ends up teaching herself the material which is fine for her because she is comfortable with independent learning. Just our anecdotal experience. As a side note, D notices the grade curve has gone way up since the school shutdown and she suspects it may be due to widespread cheating on the unproctored exams.

4687

I don’t keep up with this thread, so apologies if already posted, but this discussion on CC was briefly mentioned in the WSJ today …

https://www.wsj.com/articles/tempers-rise-as-parents-are-divided-on-whether-colleges-should-open-this-fall-11590319800

4688

We have a mix of large schools in urban areas and a handful of smaller schools in more remote areas. The majority would be considered urban, but not necessarily on the scale of being in Toronto. Many are located in more mid-sized cities with populations below 1 million. As to whether most are off campus housing, generally on-campus housing is predominantly first year and depends on location (e.g. U of T/Ryerson/York which are in Toronto are more commuter campuses, Queen’s, McMaster, and UWO which are in mid-sized cities are far more residential). The response of the schools though is being driven by the provicial government which has been very conservative in relaxing our SAH directives. We are currently at stage 1 which isn’t much different than stage 0. They have made no announcements as to when stage 2 will commence but it is generally thought to be June 1. The government has also said that they will not hesitate to lock things down again if our numbers start to increase too much (though what that number is I don’t know).

4689

This is behind a paywall - is there any way someone with access could post the portion referencing cc?

4690

Outside of the universities in the GTA (U of T/York/Ryerson) the remainder are far more residential whether that be on-campus residences or off-campus student housing. Those schools have very active on campus student social lives though not predominantly sports based. DS19 attends one such school and lived in residence this past year. His experience in the fall will be vastly different with online courses only. As to U of T, no most of their lectures are not already online. That 60,000 number is inclusive of all 3 campuses. The main campus downtown Toronto has an undergraduate population of around 44,000 with approximately 8,500 being first year.

4691

@NJdad07090 you are right that my broad stroke idea of a closed campus for the students has a lot of holes in it. But that’s what broad strokes are about, and then the details (where the devils always are) flesh out whether that’s a workable idea or not. I think the biggest hole in my idea is the off campus students. My thought process was based off of the following:

1- an article I read during the height of the quarantine that acknowledged the difficulty of being hyper vigilant at all times and suggested that instead you should focus on the inside of your house being your safe zone, and the outside being the danger zone, so that you exercise all cautions in the danger zone and clean everything that you bring into the safe zone, so you can relax in your safe zone

2- seeing how people in my community are completely disregarding social distancing, masks and other safety protocols

3- concern for the profs, admin, and support staff who are all more at risk, as well as concern for spread in the adjoining community

4- the 14 day quarantine imposed on travelers by many countries and some states such as HI and RI, in the hopes of preventing an infected person coming into the state from transmitting to others,

5- the article by Dr Erin Bromage that talked about the importance of exposure time, and

6- other articles about viral load accumulating in inside air

My idea had the profs teaching remotely but interacting with the kids in real time on a big screen, and as many admin and support staff as possible working remotely. To the extent admin and support staff must be present, execute vigilant safety protocols for them. And in order to continue to support local businesses while still keeping a closed campus, allow for drop off delivery (payment made remotely at the time of the order). But otherwise, if the campus can be a closed campus and the kids are virus-free (which they should be after the 14 day quarantine period), the kids on campus could interact with each other regularly. So you could have TA sessions, study sessions, on campus ECs, intermural sports, and on campus parties.

But I think @homerdog is correct in that the schools have been thinking extensively about this and there is nothing that any of us is going to suggest that they haven’t thought of and debated.

4692

When I was a homeschooling mom, I took the Art of Problem Solving online calculus course to review calculus. I found it splendid. It’s clearly aimed at people who are quick to grasp math concepts. If your daughter needs a more gradual approach, a different class would be better.

4693

I think Florida Virtual school also has AP Calc.

4694

A dis­cus­sion thread ti­tled School in the Fall & Coro­n­avirus on the Col­lege Con­fi­den­tial on­line fo­rum be­came so heated in re­cent days, the mod­er­a­tor deleted 11 posts and urged par­tic­i­pants to be civil.

4695

AoPS is awesome but very expensive.

4696

I think most colleges with very large endowments can afford to delay their decision about if and how the campus will be open in the fall. For example, I would think Harvard is not too worried about a large group of students deciding not to attend because they waited an extra 4 weeks to make a decision in the fall. These universities want to be perceived as leaders in the college educational industry and will wait until they have all of the facts at their disposal. The last thing they want to do is say “we are open in the fall” and a month later say, sorry it’s too risky.

I actually applaud them for waiting for as much information as possible. With that said, unless there is some unforeseen huge spike in cases this summer, all of the major universities will be accepting students and faculty back to campus, under strict public safety guidelines and procedures. All will have online class options, both with kids on campus and as an option if they have to shutdown the campus again.

No one thinks the 2020/2021 academic school year will be business as usual.

4697

The cost may (or may not) be comparable to a community college course, which is the alternative method of instruction available to the OP’s daughter. For us, the cost is about the same as a three credit course at our nearest community college.

4698

"I need to have college football especially Big Ten! "

I think you’ll get football, but probably at empty stadiums. Not sure on tailgating or post game festivities. If you allowed say a third of the stadium, how would your prioritize who gets the tickets? This is a big part of the culture at many schools.

4699

The Art of Problem Solving costs $675 for a class that prepares the student for the BC Calculus exam.

4700

I agree with this notion. If football players are just regular students, then they shouldn’t get special dispensation to return to campus not to take classes.

https://www.detroitnews.com/story/sports/college/university-michigan/2020/05/24/mark-schlissel-no-athletics-michigan-unless-theres-campus-classes/5252741002/

4701

Will they do the same for faculty, i.e., terminate for cause?