Robot testing, faculty concerns, and suspensions for partying: That’s life at B.U. during COVID-19
“Being here at B.U., I’m 100 percent confident that I’m safe from the coronavirus.”
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At Boston University this semester, the party rules are a one-and-done situation.
Any student who hosts or attends a party or large gathering — of 25 people or more — either on or off campus will be suspended, Associate Provost and Dean of Students Kenneth Elmore wrote in a notice posted online Wednesday.
“The choices you make will play a critical role in minimizing transmission of COVID-19, within the University community and within our neighboring communities,” Elmore wrote. “If you suspend good judgment, you risk exposing yourself and others to the coronavirus and will face disciplinary action.”
According to Elmore, students who live in dormitories and violate the rule will have to move out immediately and will not be able to reside on campus for the rest of the academic year. Clubs and sports teams that break the rules by hosting an event will see their organizations suspended through the fall semester, at minimum.
Suspended students will not be allowed to attend class remotely, either. Elmore wrote.
The notice comes as students have begun flocking back to the university for what will certainly be a different semester.
As of Thursday, the school had already tested 21,033 students since July 27 through its in-house coronavirus testing system. Of those results, 34 were positive.
According to Boston 25 News, the testing process has, so far, been smooth for students, who credit the system’s speedy results to eight robots the university is using to process tests.
“It takes about five minutes. I got my test results in only 13 hours,” freshman Aidan White of Phoenixville, Pennsylvania, told the station. “Being here at B.U., I’m 100 percent confident that I’m safe from the coronavirus.”
Under school policy, students are mandated to conduct self swabs at one of four collection centers on campus once every three days, the news station reports.
“I know everyone around me has got a negative test within 72 hours at least,” freshman Kristina Nicolas, of West Greenwich, Rhode Island, said. “I can at least hang out with new friends at a distance.”
Some faculty members, however, are not feeling as safe on campus.
SEIU Local 509, the union representing nearly 1,000 full- and part-time faculty at the university, last week called on administrators to take the fall semester fully remote, as coronavirus cases have swelled at colleges and universities reopening across the country.
Their calls follow those by two Boston city councilors, who earlier this month also urged the school to forgo in-person classes.
“COVID outbreaks at the University of Notre Dame and the University of North Carolina after only one week of in-person teaching have called into question the ability for universities to guarantee the health and safety of their campus community,” SEIU Local 509 President Peter MacKinnon and Higher Education Chapter President Jaime Wilson said in a joint statement.
“Against the backdrop of these outbreaks, thousands of students at Boston University are unpacking their bags and settling in for the Fall semester,” the statement continues. “Unlike sister universities across Massachusetts, Boston University refuses to fully commit to remote instruction, putting the lives and well-being of their campus community in peril.”
Faculty members are particularly frustrated over the university’s decision not to notify them when a student in one of their classes tests positive.
As a result, members, through SEIU Local 509, have launched an email-writing campaign to University President Robert Brown, Provost Jean Morrison, and officers of the Board of Trustees, sending messages that read, in part: “In the absence of evidence to support its position, B.U. must not treat its classrooms as zones free from all risk of transmission. Both students and faculty have a right to know when they have potentially been exposed.”
Asked about the campaign Thursday, a university spokesperson told Boston.com the policy is in line with public health best practices and referenced a letter sent by Morrison and a B.U. Today article published Tuesday.
Morrison, in her letter to the school community Monday, wrote that protecting student health privacy is important to contact tracing efforts. If students feel that their privacy is not protected,”they may be less likely to fully and honestly participate in contact tracing, putting us all at higher risk,” Morrison wrote.
“While I understand the desire to seek out this information about your students, an effective contact tracing process requires a level of trust that we feel cannot be maintained if students know their testing status will be revealed to faculty or staff,” Morrison wrote. “I know this decision will be a disappointment to some of you, but I hope that you understand that we have made this decision with the ultimate goal of keeping all faculty, staff, and students as safe as possible.”
Individuals will only be notified of a positive case if they are identified as a close contact of the infected person through the contact tracing process, or if a person needs to know in order to “sanitize a particular area or assist the recovery of an individual who has tested positive,” Morrison wrote.
Still, faculty, in a post on the SEIU Local 509 website, wrote the university has not prioritized health and safety, pointing to how officials “have refused to provide adequate PPE to faculty, graduate instructors, or staff.”
“We do not consent to participate in this experiment,” the post says. “We will not back down. We will do what is necessary to protect our institution, our students, and our colleagues across the university.”
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