We wondered what would happen if colleges and universities held normal on-campus classes this fall. University of North Carolina tried it out, and has had to shut it down. Defying campus warnings, students were partying in the dorms and several clusters of Covid-19 developed.
The local paper, the Raleigh News Observer, has the story and reprints the campus paper editorial entitled, “UNC Has a Clusterf**k on Its Hands.” This outcome makes those campuses which decided to run the fall term online, with no students on campus, appear prescient.
In truth, they either guessed correctly, or had a more jaundiced insight into the fecklessness of the late adolescents who constitute the bulk of their undergraduates. In any event, now we know.
I wonder if urban so-called “commuter” campuses could hold regular classes? Relatively few of their students live on or near campus, most live with their parents or a working spouse. I’m thinking of schools like Cal State East Bay, and Los Angeles State. These tend not to have a “party school” reputation.
Later ... Turns out Notre Dame had a similar experience, according to The Wall Street Journal.
