Tuesday, January 04, 2022
The Conundrum Colleges Face
As Covid surges, colleges and universities are facing a difficult choice: whether or not to open for in-person classes as the Spring semester begins and COVID is surging. It's not an easy choice; many are still paying the costs of previous disruptions and debates over how to deal with the pandemic. Many instructors (including me) absolutely hate hybrid teaching, since it offers the worst of both in-person and online classes. Everyone is sick of wearing masks, certainly, and it appears that social distancing is not especially effective against the Omicron variant.
But... people are getting sick in record numbers, and that matters. It matters because that means some people's lives will be imperiled if we are reckless, and it matters because as members of the community get sick it will disrupt in-person classes.
A number of schools have already announced that they will start with remote learning for at least a few weeks, including the following:
Yale
Harvard
Stanford
Columbia
University of Chicago
Morehouse
Georgetown
A majority of the University of California schools
Michigan State
Colorado
Miami (FL)
Pittsburgh
LSU
DePaul
A second group intends to forge ahead with in-person classes, including these:
UC-Berkeley
Penn State
Northeastern
Princeton
Duke
Howard (with a one-week delay in starting classes)
Of course, a huge number of schools still haven't made a definitive decision (especially those which don't start classes until late January or even later).
What's the right answer? There probably is not one-- each offers trade-offs that will weigh differently to different people. And only time will tell what the virus has in store for us next...
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Last I heard Duke was starting the first week with remote and all students and staff (not just teachers) will have to have proof of Booster by the end of January. All of the staff at the Gardens were Boosted in late October when the receieved their annual flu shots.
W&M and George Mason are going to be in-person, but they're very strict about vaccines and boosters.
What I don't understand is, we have a push to keep all K-12 schools open and in-person, with masks, but no vaccine mandates or boosters (except for athletes here in noVA). What information/circumstances are leading colleges to making different decisions?
What I don't understand is, we have a push to keep all K-12 schools open and in-person, with masks, but no vaccine mandates or boosters (except for athletes here in noVA). What information/circumstances are leading colleges to making different decisions?
The K-12 vaccine mandates will have to originate at the local school board or State Education Department level. I would guess we will see a move toward this in many places for the start of the 2022 fall school year.
Fingers crossed on the mandates for Fall.
I'm still wondering, though, what data are leading colleges (that can mandate vaccines and boosters) to determine that in-person classes are so risky, while the vast majority of K-12 schools have determined that "test to stay" is the way to go, even without vaccine mandates?
I'm still wondering, though, what data are leading colleges (that can mandate vaccines and boosters) to determine that in-person classes are so risky, while the vast majority of K-12 schools have determined that "test to stay" is the way to go, even without vaccine mandates?
The general behavior of college students comes to mind. But some schools saw what happened when students came back to campus in August. At least here in Durham the case numbers went up and Omicron is far more infectious. The Duke campus is open but no classes are in session. They are playing a home basketball game tonight.
In the case of k-12 the argument is these kids need to be in a structured environment with some attempt at learning. Locally the first 2 days back were canceled because of the storm (rain and snow) and then some local power outages which impacted the schools.
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In the case of k-12 the argument is these kids need to be in a structured environment with some attempt at learning. Locally the first 2 days back were canceled because of the storm (rain and snow) and then some local power outages which impacted the schools.
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