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Education Dive
Colleges rebuke students as coronavirus outbreaks hit campus
Jeremy Bauer-Wolf
Aug. 21, 2020
Dive Brief:
As coronavirus outbreaks crop up on college campuses, administrators
have become more aggressive in their reactions and messaging,
admonishing students for behavior that flouts health rules and in some
cases, punishing them for it.
Campus leaders have suspended students, kicked them out of housing and
publicly pinned blame on those who officials say are ruining the fall
experience for their peers.
About a fifth of U.S. institutions are moving forward with primarily
in-person instruction, data shows, though the sector fears those
colleges will be unable to protect campuses amid a rise in verified
cases.
Dive Insight:
Before the academic year began, behavioral experts told Education Dive
it was unlikely college students would follow the stringent policies
administrators put in place to try to mitigate the virus.
Some students still host and attend parties, in blatant disregard of
the rules, the experts said. But many others would facilitate the
virus's spread through more innocuous actions, such as chatting too
closely with a friend or forgetting to wear a mask.
Their predictions have proven correct, as campuses nationwide report
social gatherings and outbreaks early in the school year. The
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill shifted courses online
after at least 130 positive cases were reported in its first week of
classes.
Administrators have responded by rebuking what they describe as
reckless behavior. The UNC System's new president, Peter Hans, released
a statement Thursday deriding a "very small number of students" whose
off-campus actions "unfairly" punished the "vast majority" of those who
were following the guidelines, he said.
Officials at Vanderbilt University, in a series of tweets, told
students it wouldn't tolerate them going to parties, and ignoring
safety measures like mask-wearing and social distancing. The statement
hinted at criminal penalties for students, too.
"We write this not to scare you but to be perfectly plain: The
situation happening at other universities can be avoided at Vanderbilt,
but only if you anchor down, step up, and do your part," the officials
wrote.
Other colleges have already come down on students for rule violations.
Purdue University, whose president has been a vocal proponent of
reopening campuses, suspended at least 36 students for attending a
party.
Radford University suspended at least three students for failing to
comply with its coronavirus guidelines. University of Connecticut
administrators evicted several students from on-campus housing
following reports of a crowded party in a dorm room.
And Pennsylvania State University placed a fraternity chapter on an
interim suspension after it had a party, which was documented and
spread on social media. The students had violated the university's rule
barring "socials of any kind" for Greek life organizations.
"We need to impress upon all of us the seriousness of this situation,
which begins by enforcing the basic requirements of social distancing
and masking, and we're determined to do so as clearly and consistently
as we can," Damon Sims, Penn State's vice president for Student
Affairs, said in a statement.
These social gatherings can exacerbate the virus's spread. As the
College of the Holy Cross noted in a recent statement, at least one
person who attended a recent party at an off-campus apartment tested
positive for the virus, and several others were potentially positive.
"Needless to say, this is a profoundly disappointing situation. The
students responsible for the party will be held accountable under our
Community Standards process," college officials said in the statement.
The scare tactics colleges are employing could easily backfire, said
Anna Song, a health psychology professor at the University of
California, Merced, who studies adolescent behavior.
If the messages are too extreme, students may not believe them. "They'll say, ‘Oh, is that really going to happen?'," Song said.
The brain also continues to develop through someone's mid-20s, and so
administrators can't count on students to make rational decisions.
"They just don't have the fully developed mechanisms," Song said.
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