@garland Sorry, I should have specified; Amherst and Bowdoin are giving all students, faculty, and staff (and I mean ALL of them) the option of returning or working remotely (event those who need to be on-campus to do their jobs) if we reopen in fall. I was referring to Amherst and Bowdoin, because @homerdog was talking about Bowdoin in her post.
Ok, now I don’t understand. There are some staff jobs that can not be done remotely, are you saying those people won’t be working but will be getting paid? I mean there’s no way to work remotely and cook food for the students, or clean the facilities, etc.
I know some schools did pay these types of staffers the past few months, but are they going to do that indefinitely?
@circuitrider I do agree with you that due to the virus being present on all college campuses in fall, once they bring students back to campus, they can’t really send them back home until Thanksgiving. This is especially true in the event of a massive outbreak; if they keep kids on-campus, the others who will get infected are students at extremely low-risk, but if they force them all to go home, this would cause many parents and caretakers (who are much older and possibly immunocompromised) to get infected. Not to mention, many of the students would have to take flights to get home, which could cause many third-parties to get infected as well.
@Mwfan1921 I’m not sure, but what Amherst said is that ALL faculty and staff would be able to choose whether to come back to campus. I don’t know what that means for staff members who have to be on-campus to do their jobs.
@Mwfan1921 Did contact other school but scholarship was large and passed on to next in line. Perhaps there is a plan for immuno compromised students (my student would not fall under that heading but has some health issues) but it is not being shared publicly. I do know single rooms are being set aside for immuno compromised students who could then in theory set up all larger classes (online) and stay in their dorm room to learn.
I feel once my student is on campus, living in a dorm, the risk is already such that she would rather have small in person classes
And no- no school at this date will come close to matching her scholarship with FA. Don’t get me wrong- I am thrilled with the scholarship her school has granted her. I just wish they did not require her to live on campus to keep it.
@suzyQ7 Agree people will make decisions based on current events and knowledge.
@ucbalumnus Yes, while some will factor in the long term effects of the disease, many will use a combined calculus. Also, given that information has been mixed I don’t think everyone knows that long term factors such as lung damage are present.
And once the antibody test becomes widely available the number of people willing to take the vaccine also drops. ( If I take the antibody test, for example and have a positive response, then what is my incentive to take the vaccine? Some might still get it since some folks appear to have gotten it twice. But others are just going to be happy they have the antibody.)
Are you talking about testing and finding out that many students have already had the virus? Because it’s my understanding that the sort of testing they would be doing would determine who has it RIGHT NOW. Hopefully, a decent percent of the students will not arrive at their colleges with current contagious cases.
If the antibody tests are working better by then, it seems like it would be a good idea to run those, since if people DO get some immunity (hopefully we have a better idea by then), you could forgo testing those same students regularly.
I hope antibody tests will give some clarity to the situation on campus at the beginning of the year but, without knowing how much immunity it gives someone, I doubt it will change much about how campus is run. I supposed it’s good information to have but it can’t be used to place kids together in a dorm room for example since we really have no idea if it keeps people immune for three months, six months…who knows? That would be what we need.
I get that but the article made it sound that these cadets were isolated. And if they were tested at the beginning then that means they picked up the virus at the location. I agree that if a few people are infected than the spread is faster in this kind of situation because of close proximity versus less proximity on a college campus, however, it’s still a problem that they were aware of the virus, tested for it, were obviously aware of how it spreads and it still spread- alot, and quickly within this cohort. but really not enough information on how this group associated with the other 100,000 people on this base (that many?). Were others tested? Were the leaders and staff working with this group tested? I’m sure the CDC has the information but we don’t. Again this has the makings for a good study hopefully the federal government is using it as such and will soon glean some more information about spread and share it with the public.
@roycroftmom Responding to your post from a few pages back–my D is a rising sophomore at SUNY Binghamton. This year she will be off campus–as will most of her friends. Bing recommends that students reside on campus for 2 years but do not require it. The majority of Bing upperclassmen live off campus, as do a sizable number of sophomores. At first I was not entirely thrilled with this, but have definitely warmed up to the idea as my daughter will have her own bedroom and bathroom this year.
Very unlikely–that 100s and 200s should be f2f has been already stated. It is the default. Exceptions might be granted. No guarantee.
I don’t really get all the assumptions about what colleges can and can’t do. They’ll do what’s best for them and/or whatever their state government tells them to do.
If a college becomes a hot spot the state can pull the plug immediately. Why would they wait until Thanksgiving to send students home? That just gives the virus more chance to take hold. I think colleges will dedensify as soon as their state tells them to, and if there’s a reason a particular student can’t go home they can apply for a temporary extension just like they did in March.
Agree we have no idea what schools and state health departments are going to do if and when their are outbreaks on college campuses…I haven’t seen anyone address that yet.
It seems it would not be very smart sending students home if there is an outbreak…the idea that we would knowingly send potentially infected students home via planes, trains, buses, and automobiles is disturbing.
I am sorry if you think I was calling you out in some way. I did not intend to tag you. Maybe that happened automatically because I quoted part of your post? I will be more careful about trying to respond to specific posters in the future. I was just trying to make a general observation.
Residential colleges that have a lot of “suitcase” behavior (resident students frequently going back to their family homes on ordinary weekends, not just on holiday weekends or breaks) have additional issues of this nature.
^Some fully residential colleges are likely to require all students (or the ones permitted to come back in the fall) to live on campus and not to leave campus until Thanksgiving.
If there’s an outbreak on campus, I don’t see how the college could send infected or potentially infected students back home. It has to quarantine and provide for these students. It won’t be an easy undertaking, especially if there’re a lot of such students.
@1NJParent Yeah, sending kids home early (especially in the event of an outbreak) would be a bad idea. I will say though, I don’t know what they are going to do if there is a large outbreak right before Thanksgiving.
^That’s why all colleges need a good plan to deal immediately and effectively with any outbreak and to keep it from becoming “large”. A large outbreak would be a disaster.
@austinmshauri wrote:
The colleges dodged a bullet back in March because the assumption was that most kids were negative and that evacuating them was the safest thing for them and for the general public. But, they can’t make that argument now. Even a minor outbreak would raise the spectre that there are countless asymptomatics yet to seroconvert and putting them on airlines, trains and buses would be extraordinarily thoughtless. Upwards of 70% of some of these prestige colleges have student bodies that can’t get home any other way.