My D has several athlete friends at Rice. One is a cross country runner. Rice’s conference held cross country meets this fall. Rice did not participate, but did go to the conference final meet this weekend. I believe she said her friend would be quarantined in a hotel when he came back until he was tested. I assume he will then move back into his dorm and continue on with typical covid protocols (masks, distancing, etc) though maybe he needs multiple negatives. I wouldn’t be surprised if he is tested multiple times this week (they typically just test once) if he is allowed back in his room. He has a suite style room so if he did test positive after returning to his room, he’d go to isolation and his roommate would quarantine. Not sure if he lives with other runners, but I guess he does.
She has another friend who plays tennis. She’s been playing matches, but no overnights as far as I know. I don’t believe they are doing anything special besides avoiding overnights, I wouldn’t be surprised if they are tested more frequently. She lives in a single room but shares a bathroom with one other student.
Football team started playing 2 weeks ago. They skipped their preseason games. I think most of the team lives off campus but I think freshmen still live in the dorms.
Not sure any other sports have really started as most have been pushed off the spring. It seems like the school is trying to balance letting the kids play with being as safe as possible. So far no outbreaks in the teams. But Rice doesn’t have a goal of zero positives. Kids are allowed off campus and off campus kids are allowed on campus as long as they test weekly. So far they have had 25 undergrads test positive since August 1st and I think around 9 of those were people who tested on arrival (and I know at least 2 were false positives). When someone tests positive they quickly get isolated and they quickly do contract tracing and the contacts are quarantined. Kids do not get in trouble for breaking the rules based on the info they report during contract tracing. So far, most of the positive tests have been kids who live off campus so they have changed some of their testing policies with off campus kids. D says no one wants to be responsible for getting their friends sick so they are pretty good about following the rules.
Though this semester has not been the same as last year, I would say overall D is having a good experience. Quite a few kids who chose to stay home are coming back this semester. But, D says some people she knows who are on campus plan to stay home if they don’t have more in person classes.
Thanks for the information. Someone did post earlier but I think it may have been the preliminary findings.
What do folks here think about the increase in the For Profit Schools? They stand out. Is it just a mathematical quirk, since they account for such a small % of the population, so a small increase shows up % as greater?
Obviously, they must be offering programs that the 2 year community colleges and possibly 4 year non-profits are not offering. I just hear some horror stories so I hope students (of all ages) are not being misled.
MIT announced their Spring plan, which is in line with expectations.
A two week delayed start (mid-Feb, after January Independent Activities Period, which will be fully online this year), years 1-3 on campus, mostly online instruction, “pods”, and regular testing.
The decision is pending on allowing seniors living off-campus access to campus in the spring.
Great to hear, will there be a Spring Break, what about spring sports? Williams eliminated spring break and we are still waiting to hear whether NESCAC schools will have spring sports.
No Spring break (some long weekends in its stead), no winter sports, decision on Spring sports is pending (though collegiate sports is a non-issue for us personally).
So they are allowing all students back on campus (freshman-juniors with housing), with seniors living off campus but allowed back on campus for everything else?
“We will make a decision by the end of the semester about whether seniors who choose to live nearby can have access to campus facilities in the same way that graduate students who live off campus do now. We will be able to make a more informed determination after we learn more about our ability to manage the health of our community during cold weather, with Covid-19 prevalence on the rise and flu season beginning, and after we see how many first-years, sophomores, and juniors will access campus in the spring.”
My D20’s college, University of Puget Sound, just announced they will be opening dorms to all students for spring semester. They were not open for fall.
Wow, I’m fascinated that MIT is leaving the seniors out for spring. I know it may seem “fair” that each class will have one semester on campus, but to deliberately plan for seniors to be left out in the spring seems so odd. What an anti-climactic way to finish college. Could definitely leave those graduates with a bad taste. I know it happened abruptly to seniors last spring, they missed the last ~6 weeks of college on campus, but it was so unexpected and no one could fault the colleges. This seems like they could have planned better, IMHO. I hope they can figure out a way to at least welcome them to access campus for those who choose to rent in the area.
At Amherst there will not be a spring break, but there will be several days off intermittently throughout the spring semester.
Also, even though this was not stated, I would presume that finals week and reading period in spring would be on-campus, since there is no week-long break before the end of the semester which sends all students home.
@TennisParent I would be extremely surprised if NESCAC had spring sports. Unless they can somehow get students vaccinated by the end of March (very unlikely), I think sports for NESCACs is a no-go until Fall 2021.
@RosePetal35 I agree. It’s just not sustainable for most schools to remain closed. My boys have been back at public school since August with no issues, so we know it can work.
I agree and it would also support my belief back in June or July that rather than a matter of noblesse oblige (a popular assertion pushed on this thread), HYPSM could not re-open at 100% capacity for the coming Fall semester because as large, urban universities with little to no plant surplus, they just didn’t have the flexibility that the NESCAC colleges did.
Wait, didn’t at least some of those NESCAC colleges, after much protestation, end up with substantially similar plans that lead OP’s kid to take a gap year at Bowdoin as a result?
Interesting to me that any colleges would be taking a “more open” approach to spring semester. Bringing back different classes but roughly the same number of kids overall makes sense. Opening up for spring to the same extent you did in fall also makes sense (at least to the extent what you did in fall worked – however that is defined). But what do colleges see to say we think we can be more open in the spring than we were in the fall (particularly early in the spring semester)? Other than I suppose additional money from kids coming back to campus.