To Open or Not to Open: Colleges and Universities Seek a Return to “Normal”
/by David Johnston
Even college students want to return to campus, to see their friends, interact with faculty, and pursue their futures. No offense to Zoom, but its centrality to education at the present time is growing old, and nearly a fifth of more challenged students have not had easy access to online learning and are surely falling further behind. Also, many colleges, especially private ones, cannot afford not to reopen, having had much of their expected income vanish in the world-wide fog of the pandemic.
Most faculty have done commendable work teaching online, as they had to convert to it within a matter of days as schools sent students home. Some online teaching is good, some not so good, and colleges (not to mention K-12 school systems, a whole other can of worms) have created comprehensive professional development to improve the quality of online instruction. No doubt much of that will continue.
But is re-opening this fall really a good idea? Is the risk of widespread infection from a surprisingly deadly virus, if not for younger students, but definitely for older faculty, not to mention older family members at home – and for campus staff? Also, it’s now clear from recent data that even younger people are at risk, as the spikes in infections in states that have opened up demonstrate. It seems that bars have turned into “superspreader” sites as 20-somethings “return to normal.”
Is the risk worth it for colleges and universities, never mind the liability risk? In Connecticut, the State’s community colleges and universities have said they will reopen; but the measures that will be needed to minimize the risk are still being developed. Private colleges and universities are in the same place – officially reopening but still working out the details on how to do this safely. We suspect that online learning will continue but underlying on-campus classes, with appropriate social distancing measures in place; and administrators hoping that their young students will practice them consistently.
Recent articles in the Chronicle of Higher Education make the case for both reopening and not reopening. Questions that every school must answer are complicated. For example, will campuses be able to do enough testing and tracing on campus? How will desks be disinfected after every class in rooms with multiple classes in a day? How will social distancing be enforced in classes, dorms, in cafeterias? How will older faculty and staff be protected? These challenges and others are being planned for now; but if a campus experiences a spike in CV-19 cases, will it shut down again?
These are not easy choices and are dilemmas, like the virus, we have not faced before. But colleges and universities have many smart people, not to mention many, many smart students, who will rise to the occasion with innovative solutions. After all, it is their future that is most at stake.
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