Towson flips to fully remote learning for first semester.
@ChaosParent23 that sounds similar to Denison’s approach on socialization. Rather than banning it completely, they’re focusing on what can be done safely. They’ve put up some big tents on the lawn and added more lawn chairs and some hammocks, and they are actively soliciting ideas from the students. At the same time, I understand that some students who have ignored the rules and organized larger gatherings have been asked to leave, and I imagine that must be making an impression on the rest. Overall, the school seems to be trying to foster a spirit of camaradarie in a difficult situation. Hopefully, this approach will work well at least until the weather turns cold and they can make it to mid-November.
How Germany is reopening K-12 schools for full-time in person learning:
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Really low community transmission; the country’s test positivity is currently below 1 %
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Fast and free testing and robust contact tracing : at one of the schools featured in the article, a student’s relative tested positive after being traced as a contact of another person who brought the virus back from vacation. The student and all those at the school who had been near her were tested at school by a mobile testing unit; results (all negative) came back within 24 hours. Also, teachers can get free tests whenever they want, no symptoms required.
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Schools are limiting the mixing of students so that any outbreaks can be better identified and contained.
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Students and staff must wear masks and keep physical distance outside the classroom but are NOT required to do so in the classroom, and classrooms continue to have the normal number of students sitting close together. As is the case in many countries, there just aren’t enough teachers to de-densify classrooms. Instead, schools are focusing on improving classroom ventilation.
SDSU began its fall semester Monday with 2,600 students living in dorms, down two thirds from the 7,500 the school normally houses on campus.
@tkoparent I wish that had been Kenyon’s approach! I don’t know, maybe they just worded everything too strongly and didn’t actually expect kids to isolate before they had their test results. Whatever the case may be, it sounds like kids are being pretty smart. S said he had heard of anything going on indoors, and he didn’t see anything outside larger than 8 or so. He said most groups were like 3-7, max.
I think there are alot of families holding their breath, and hoping for the best… but have an emergency plan!
I would be furious if we were paying board but our son wasn’t getting meals after making the decision to isolate on his own. Alabama should be embarrassed. Those students are doing the right thing and I applaud them but the university is not doing their part.
I don’t think anyone said they weren’t getting food, did they?
Elon disciplining students for violating gathering rules.
At Duke, they did not test before arrival but at the last minute asked that students “quarantine” 14 days prior to arrival on campus. Once at campus, they tested the students and they isolated for 24-48 hours awaiting test results. Now that classes have started they are doing lots of random testing of students in an attempt to quickly identify and isolate any infected students. Seems to be working ok for now? These next few weeks will be critical to determining if on-campus housing with some in-person classes can be achieved this fall?
My kid goes to a small (3K) LAC in Holland, MI, a small (33K) town in SW Michigan that has been conducting in person classes since 8/17. Just prior to arrival, they had everyone (students and staff) do a saliva based test through Vault Health. A test kit was shipped to us. We sent the overnight packet back via UPS on the same day we received it (8/4), the lab received it on 8/5, and we got the result by email from Vault on 8/7. It was followed by an email from the college confirming the negative result and cautioning about continuing to be careful, that the test might not catch an infection if it’s in a very early stage, etc, and to be watchful for symptoms. My student moved into the dorm on 8/15.
Now that the students are on campus, the school is doing wastewater testing as well as random surveillance testing (1% per day) and of course testing of anyone who is symptomatic. https://www.bridgemi.com/michigan-health-watch/swabs-sewage-and-campus-bubbles-can-covid-testing-keep-colleges-open. Today my student was notified via email of the need to schedule a test in the next 48 hours at the campus health center. (There is a separate entrance to the health center for Covid testing and concerns.)
Masks are mandatory on campus at all times unless you are in your own dorm room (or private office if you’re staff) or outside and more than 6’ away from others. You’re not allowed to have anyone in your dorm room who is not your roommate.
The shuttle bus that takes students to the local grocery store has been replaced with a bigger, new bus where seats and rows are blocked off so that you can’t sit side by side or right in front or behind someone else.
Three of my kid’s 5 classes are F2F, seated 6’ apart, with the professor behind plexiglass. My kid also has one class that’s synchronous online, and an asynchronous PE class (which is a Gen Ed requirement). I’m not sure exactly what’s going on with the PE class except that I know they’re using Strava.
The campus is immediately adjacent to downtown Holland. The downtown merchants all seem to be on board with mask usage, encouraging distancing, setting up outdoor dining, etc. My kid went into a mini-mart and another customer walked in without a mask, and the cashier sent him away.
The food in the 2 dining halls is all grab 'n go, and the seating capacity in the dining halls is very limited. People are encouraged to eat outdoors and they’ve set up a food truck in the large grassy, shady are in the center of campus. In terms of socialization, they’re encouraging students to do as much as possible outdoors and organizing outdoor stuff. Right now the weather is great so eating and socializing outdoors works. I’m not so sure how this will work in winter, but one step at a time.
They apparently did allow students to move in. Even though a lot of D20’s friends are attending, we don’t know anyone who moved in. They are local and are just staying home with their families since classes are all online.
It’s really disappointing to see/hear students are not adhering to mask wearing rules at SDSU.
eta: This is particularly bad because the campus is so integrated with the surrounding community. The Trader Joe’s on campus, where the students shop, is also our family’s local Trader Joes, where we tend to shop. Some eateries on campus are also places that community members frequent.
Duke requested students test before arriving with the caveat “if available”. We tested before leaving for Durham and so did most of the people my daughter has been communicating with - I think most parents would much rather find out that they’re positive before landing in NC.
The Alabama kids earlier in this thread who decided to test and isolate on their own sound like they are going to either eat the raman, etc., in their rooms or get door dash.
@PetraMC - you said "It’s the same reason schools like Auburn and ND and Mizzou didn’t do a whole lot to prepare: if/when they get it, and they will, few will get very sick and it costs too much money to do it right. "
I can’t believe you can say this with a straight face. I can’t speak to Auburn or Mizzou, but Notre Dame has spent millions preparing. Today’s up date - 13 new cases (2 from surveillance). Overall positive rate is 11.5%. Positive rate in the surveillance only is 1.1% with roughly 1900 tests since August 1. They are clearly trending in the right direction and doing the right things. I have heard anecdotal accounts of problems, but they appear to be isolated and not system wide.
Please be careful when passing judgement.
@homerdog and @shuttlebus - my ASU student was required to find testing before being allowed to move into student housing. We went to a “baseline project” site in our county in central CA. They were the only ones that would test someone who only needed the test for college. ASU offered a second option of onsite testing in Tempe. That’s great for local people, but gladly we did not need to camp out in a hotel for several days to make sure he could move in.
IMO, these colleges that are opening up their campuses and classes to students are offering up their students to be guinea pigs as to how this age group holds up to COVID19 and their longer term consequences.
It’s a great source of info for medical researchers. Have a large contained group during a short time period.
Florida Gulf Coast U suspending 2 Fraternities for hosting large parties a week after campus opening. Sigh.
https://www.mysuncoast.com/2020/08/25/fgcu-fraternities-suspended-after-hosting-party/
Update for my DS’s schools - Notre Dame and ASU.
Notre Dame has started surveillance testing. Since August 1, they have tested roughly 20% of the students through this method. The positive rate is 1.1% (20 out of 1860). The overall positive rate is at 11.5% - down from almost 20% at its peak on 8/19. The positive case rate from today’s update is 3%.
ASU does not have a dashboard. President Crow provided an update yesterday. ASU worked with its engineering and biodesign people to get an FDA approved Saliva PCR test. They are using this internally developed test at ASU and the greater Phoenix area. They are doing surveillance testing on the roughly 100,000 student, faculty and staff population. Since August 1 they have conducted 32,729 tests with 161 known positives (a 0.5% positive test rate for those playing at home). They are about 1 week in, so I expect to see that number increase substantially. We will see how this unfolds.
President Crow’s letter is at https://president.asu.edu/statements/an-update-on-asu%E2%80%99s-covid-19-management-strategy
Somewhere in this thread someone implied that as “adults” students in quarantine should be able to figure things out - get food, their bedding, be flexible, rally friends to help etc. Ah, I don’t think so.
The colleges wanted to collect R&B, they need to meet their obligations.