People are gonna do what whatever they want. I stopped giving advice about 100 pages ago.
Two of our kids are in high school every other day, and they frequently get together with friends after school (outside). Our college student is studying at home, but goes camping/hiking with friends and has been on trips out-of-state.
Here’s our plan for visiting grandparents at Thanksgiving: Get tested on Tuesday. The results will be available on Wednesday. If we are negative, we have two more safe days, so we can get together on Thursday/Friday, and come home Saturday.
Here in NY, we can get tested without symptoms, doctor’s visit, or prescription. Our insurance pays in full. If this were the case for everyone, everywhere, I think we would have much better luck containing the virus.
@3SailAway – I wonder if the turnaround time on testing will extend with increased demand prior to Thanksgiving, since many people will have a similar testing plan pre-holiday?
I know an NU freshman whose parents are furious about the last minute change to not have kids on campus. No time to find something else to do if one wanted to defer. Felt like had zero option but for her to take class from home. I think some NU freshmen might be looking to transfer after this fiasco. NU had so much time to decide being on the quarter system and already starting later than schools with semesters and Shapiro still messed it up.
It might. We plan to call ahead to ask the turnaround time for testing at the urgent care by us. If it’s more than 24 hours, we will drive further to a site where they have the Abbott ID NOW test (results in 15 minutes).
@homerdog I wonder how many OOS first years are living at the Hilton Garden Inn and the Orrington. I know they have at least one floor at the Hilton Garden Inn, both singles and doubles.
I’m not sure either. This dad I talked to said they know kids in The Orrington but there’s no way to cook. It’s not ideal.
They shouldn’t be at the Orrington at all but the last minute pivot was ridiculous. We have seen a steady upward trend in cases in Evanston in the last 5 days. So far the positivity rate is still only 1.6% but we were close to dipping below 1% until students started returning. The Evanston numbers don’t include NU students and staff. Their NU dashboard, which is only updated weekly, said 15 positives this week and 24 total cases. Evanston has been average 3 or less cases for two months…until now 
The late Northwestern pivot must be really frustrating but it probably occurred less from poor planning on Shapiro’s part and more from the Covid situation in Illinois. I mean the numbers in Illinois don’t seem to be budging. Some of the states that were hot spots in July (AZ, TX, FL) have made progress with case numbers dropping, but doesn’t seem to be the case for Illinois and that probably led to the late decision.
Correct me if I’m wrong but I think U Chicago made their decision earlier. They are also on quarters.
“NU had so much time to decide being on the quarter system and already starting later than schools with semesters and Shapiro still messed it up.”
This an unusually harsh criticism of NU or any university of changing plans of Covid, because information about the virus changes daily. I have a lot of respect for NU (didn’t attend fyi) because I know a lot of its graduates (some Kellogg) and they liked the school and the grads are top notch.
Stay off of Reddit… Lol. Every schools student body seems to be bashing their schools plans… ?
Ha! My H and I are NU alums (undergrad) and criticize NU all of the time! Lol.
I know of a few. By the time college students get to the point of renting a space together, they probably have a pretty clear idea of whether or not they are risk takers or rule followers. For the latter, it’s probably not that big a deal to socially distance with masks indoors for 10 days. Students who come from areas that were slammed with COVID also might be more likely to exercise caution.
Wake Forest is on par with expectations so far. D21 and S24 are both managing well, happy to be there.
Here’s the latest update from the school:
"In recent days, there has been an increase of known, confirmed positive cases in our campus community. During consultations with public health experts before the start of the semester, they predicted that we could see this kind of increase in positive cases two to four weeks after the start of the semester.
Wake Forest prepared for this increase by implementing random testing, ramping up contact tracing, and ensuring the availability of quarantine and isolation space. The process is functioning as designed, and these measures have been effective in mitigating community spread, as indicated by the results from the random sample last week.
Increases in the last few days are related to 1) testing of populations where we have received indicators of infection through our SneezSafe daily monitoring system; 2) testing of individuals and student groups potentially exposed to the virus and in quarantine; and 3) effective contact tracing. The majority of new positive results have come from students who were already in quarantine.
In the first two weeks of our random testing program, 872 tests yielded three positive cases. This gives us a 0.34 percent rate of positive. One of those three positive cases is under further investigation as it could have been a residual positive.
As we do more routine testing of students who have indicated potential symptoms, individuals and student groups potentially exposed to the virus, and individuals tested through our random testing program, it is likely we will continue to see our overall positive tests increase.
We continue to remain in our yellow operating status. The University’s operating status is not determined solely by the number of positive cases but several factors that help explain the prevalence and nature of COVID-19 spread at Wake Forest. Community compliance with public health measures, capacity of resources to mitigate risk and the situation in our community all inform the University operating level."
FWIW, Wake has had 115 positive cases that it knows of since opening week.
Loyola managed to make their decision 8/6 and they are just a couple of miles down the road in Rogers Park.
I think the tough part about NU is that they confirmed having students come to campus and pivoted 4 days later. Students had already starting moving in by then.
There’s a video update from Dr. Chris Ohl, infectious disease specialist at the WFU School of Medicine that further informs their approach to the pandemic in the “Communications” area of the WFU Covid website.
Here’s the link if the moderators will allow it:
Here’s an update from the Colgate University’s VP of Communications.
"Hello, Colgate Community.
Because we are in this together, the choices of the few will have consequences for the many. Due to violations of the Commitment to Community Health, additional students will be heading home once it is safe for them to leave the area. Among them are two who tested positive for COVID-19 after traveling outside Hamilton and interacting with individuals beyond the Colgate community.
Those two student cases alone have resulted in 36 of their peers being placed in close-contact quarantine. A third student has also tested positive in an unrelated case, and based on conversations, we expect the Madison County Department of Health to identify even more close contacts.
The Task Force on Reopening is reviewing these significant violations to determine if they will prevent us from moving to Gate 2 next week. If that is the case, we will not be opening the fitness and recreation centers as originally planned. Gatherings will continue to be in groups 10 or fewer with no permission to visit friends in other residence halls or hang out in bedrooms.
Our ability to remain together is predicated on our ability to act with integrity. Make no mistake. The decision to travel, host guests, share car rides, and otherwise violate the Commitment to Community Health is even now jeopardizing that ability."
The Community Leaders (RAs) have been very busy writing reports of violations by students since the campus opened Aug. 24. Frustrations abound on campus among those who follow the guidelines, content to be on campus seeing their friends despite the restrictions, adapting to their new normal and those students who just lack the commitment to adhere to the guidelines and continue to do so despite the warnings. The thing is, how many warnings can one student get before the school act on them? I’ve been hearing complaints about the same group of students not complying. That was a couple of weeks ago. So its not surprising to see this message from the school. Well, looks like the campus might stay on Gate 1. Let’s see in a couple of days where the campus stands in terms of keeping their metrics better.
Am I wrong or was Colgate the only Patriot League member to invite all four classes back to campus?