Coronavirus Impact
Science magazine reports on a new survey of U.S.-based STEM Ph.D. students in which 40% reported symptoms consistent with generalized anxiety disorder and 37% with major depressive disorder-increases of 13 and 19 percentage points, respectively, compared with 2019. “The results are very alarming,” says Krista Soria, the director for student affairs assessment at the University of Minnesota and one of the researchers who conducted the survey. “It’s really, really important for campuses to understand that their students are experiencing these things.” Susanna Harris, a Ph.D. microbiologist and the founder and CEO of PhD Balance, a website that provides space for mental health discussions among graduate students, says that academic and Ph.D. culture can breed isolation in the best of times, but social distancing has interfered with traditional coping mechanisms. And uncertainty about the future has added another layer of anxiety.
The Exponent, Purdue University’s student newspaper, reports that switching to remote mental health services has diminished student access. Legal restrictions on telehealth services out-of-state and students’ hesitation about the technology has left some feeling that they can’t get the care they need from CAPS. “I’ve heard a lot of mixed reviews, but for me I think virtually doing it might be harder,” one student said. “I don’t know if starting it within this context is the best way to go.”
The Universe reports that as most of Brigham Young University’s fall NCAA-sanctioned sports have been postponed, athlete mental health is top of mind for those who work with them. “A lot of the predictable and controllable factors that we used to enjoy are no longer there. “That generally causes anxiety,” said Natalie Kirtley, a psychologist who works with the BYU Athletic Department. Kirtley said the unexpected change is exacerbated by the impact these changes have had on athlete’s sense of identity. “When you take away seasons and sport participation, the athletes’ sense of identity changes dramatically,” she said.
According to a report by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, college attendance among Black students dropped 8 percent during the 2020 summer session, compared with the summer of 2019. Low-income students of most races and ethnicities were far less likely to attend a summer term than they had in the past, as measured by enrollment declines at community colleges. Meanwhile, the report indicates that enrollment increased for higher-income students. “This pandemic has really affected the most vulnerable students, the most disadvantaged students,” said Doug Shapiro, executive director of the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center and author of the report. “We’re seeing a dramatic split between what’s happening at four-year institutions and what’s happening at community colleges, rural, online and for-profit institutions.”
Colleges and universities across the U.S. continue to struggle with reopening their campuses, with many experiencing sharp rises in COVID-19 cases. A New York Times review of 203 counties where students comprise at least 10 percent of the population, found that about half experienced their worst weeks of the pandemic since Aug. 1.
Students at University of Mississippi were ordered to quarantine last week after an outbreak. More than 700 confirmed student cases have been reported at the University of Missouri‘s Columbia campus since in-person classes resumed. The University of Iowa and Iowa State have become homes to some of the worst outbreaks in the nation. University of Iowa students have reported that they are unable to get coronavirus tests and many of their peers are not following isolation orders.
The University of Illinois, which has one of the largest mass testing programs of any American institution, reported more than 700 new cases between Aug. 24 and 31 and announced a two-week lockdown for undergraduates. The university had been touted by researchers as a potential model for reopening campuses to in-person classes, and the announcement has called into question whether any amount of resources and safety precautions makes it possible to safely reopen college campuses. University officials attributed the uptick to students ignoring health guidance by attending large social gatherings and not heeding instructions to isolate.
Other universities experiencing outbreaks include the University of Dayton, Ohio State University, University of Georgia, University of Kentucky, Temple University, the State University of New York at Oneonta and San Diego State University, which issued a stay-at-home order, asking students to remain in their dorms except for essential needs through the weekend.
WBUR‘s On Point explored what life currently looks like on campus and how decisions are being made with guests Andy Thomason, senior editor at the Chronicle of Higher Education, Holden Thorp, editor-in-chief of Science Magazine, Professor of chemistry and medicine at Washington University in St. Louis, and former chancellor of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Caroline Anders, a senior at Indiana University and editor at the Indiana Daily Student.
Professor Michael Siegel, a professor at the Boston University School of Public Health and leading public health expert, sharply criticized the school’s plan to offer in-person classes in a letter shared with the BUSPH community, calling it “discriminatory,” “racist,” and “motivated by money.” He wrote, “In the decisions we were making, we were doing things differently than we’d teach our students.”
Student parties and gatherings have been a source of frustration for administrators and students are facing serious consequences for breaking the rules. New York University, Ohio State, Purdue and West Virginia University have all suspended students over violations of rules intended to curb the virus’s spread on campus. Fraternities and sororities at a number of universities, including University of New Hampshire, have also been suspended. The University of South Carolina suspended 15 students and charged six Greek houses with student conduct violations for parties. Administrators at Indiana University are recommending that all 40 Greek houses shut down, as mitigation testing positivity rates at those houses are as high as 87%.
The most severe crackdown came at Northeastern University, which announced it had dismissed 11 students who gathered in a hotel room in violation of the school’s coronavirus policies. The school, which has faced significant criticism since their announcement, also said it will not refund their $36,500 tuition payment. Public health experts cautioned that draconian actions may do more harm than good, creating a chilling effect that discourages students from participating in contact tracing or reporting their symptoms. For WBUR, Eileen McNamara advised Northeastern to return the tuition money. She wrote, “It is nothing short of theft for Northeastern to keep the $36,500 each of those students - or more likely those students’ parents - plunked down for a semester that was only days old …” She continued, “For administrators to claim to be shocked, just shocked, to discover that some of the 800 teenagers living in a swanky downtown hotel being used as a temporary dormitory threw a party is not an especially flattering reflection on said administrators.”
Hannah Lang, a senior at Dartmouth College, wrote for WBUR that colleges should have incorporated student input into their reopening plans. “Too often, instead of engaging students, they admonished us for the actions of a few,” she writes. With a group of peers, Lang conducted focus groups with students to help determine how Dartmouth could best support student compliance with public health guidelines. They found that the majority of students interviewed were excited to have their voices heard and they had creative ideas for how the administration could offer support.
Civil liberties advocates are concerned students are being unfairly suspended or placed on probation for violations of college health and safety rules. However, student affairs administrators say they must weigh removing individual students whose actions pose public health or safety risks with the need to keep others on campus safe. Martha Compton, president of the Association of Student Conduct Administrators, or ASCA, said, “There’s a balance there between the individual rights of the student to have a fair process but also the health and safety of the campus.”
Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said that sending students home from campus amid Covid-19 outbreaks is “the worst thing you could do.” “When you send them home, particularly when you’re dealing with a university where people come from multiple different locations, you could be seeding the different places with infection,” he said. However, as cases rise sharply on some campuses, there is concern that there will not be adequate capacity in isolation dorms. Holden Thorp, editor in chief of the Science family of journals and a former chancellor of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, told the Chronicle that while Fauci’s advice is probably correct, ” it is a major miss that it wasn’t given to the universities as they were making their decisions to come back. I’m sure that was tough because the president was tweeting and talking about how colleges needed to come back.”
Twenty-one institutions (nearly half) in the Atlantic Coast Conference, Southeastern Conference and Big 12 Conference declined to disclose positive COVID-19 cases among athletes to ESPN, citing federal student privacy laws. These three “Power Five” conferences are all preparing to play football games this month.
The New York Times explored what it’s like for students being asked to police their peers’ actions. “Nobody likes snitching - it’s not comfortable,” said Melissa Montejo, a sophomore at Cornell University. “I really am not one to go around and tell people what to do, but for me, this was troubling. Three months of being careful and not engaging in problematic behavior is worth saving a life.” A student at Binghamton University in upstate New York said, “Before coming here, I remember thinking ‘Yeah, I’ll definitely report people if they’re going to parties” But a few days on campus has changed the way he feels. “It’s a lot harder to want to when you’re living and going to class with everyone,” he said. Hearing about harsh punishments at other schools has also dissuaded some students from speaking up.
The Chronicle explores how three colleges are using student ambassadors to enforce social distancing on campus. The University of Michigan at Ann Arbor hired teams of student “public-health ambassadors” to enforce Covid-19 regulations among their classmates. Columbia University’s ambassador program, which does not pay their students, focuses on “education rather than enforcement.” The University of Miami hired 75 students at $10 an hour to help enforce safety guidelines among their peers.
Slate magazine published an excerpt from a conversation with Inés Eisenhour, a student public health ambassador at the University of Miami . She says that while she has encountered students who ignore her guidance, “I’ve found the most effective way of getting someone to listen to me without upsetting them is reminding them that I’m there to help them and I don’t have any authority to hand out consequences. I’m the warning before someone actually gets in trouble.”