Written by: Kylee Doty
In early February, Adrian College released a statement that there were zero COVID-19 cases on campus. Since then, cases continued to fluctuate. Later in February, the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases on campus was 37. Now, at the time of this writing (Mar. 15) that number is down to five. Students on the AC campus have a lot to say about the pandemic and campus. Many of them talked to The College World but wanted to remain anonymous:
“I have a friend who lives in campus housing who had a positive test and was in quarantine when they reported it. It’s also highly suspicious that there were somehow “no cases” but now they’re reporting four. The harsh reality of what’s going on right now is that they aren’t actually keeping track of things very well and positive cases are flying under the radar. I had to personally call the health center when I found out I had been in contact with a student who tested positive because they didn’t contact me. And come to find out they didn’t even have the student’s name on their list of positive cases. Things are just chaotic and messy because they don’t care about what is actually going on, they just care that they look good. Meanwhile they’re overpopulating classrooms and not following through on things like ensuring all students were tested before returning to campus, temperature checks, and symptom checks.”
“I actually work in the health center, which is where all the emails get sent from! And I honestly believe that they are reporting the cases that they are aware of. If there are cases on campus, they have not been reported to the health center like they are supposed to be. Prime example, I live off campus and my roommate got COVID-19 from someone on campus (a few weeks ago) and the health center was not aware of it at all cause she got tested off campus and then did not tell the health center at school. They were only made aware when I told them I couldn’t go to work because I had to quarantine (luckily I never got COVID-19) because she went home when she found out she had it.”
“As a general student here on campus, I don’t think that the college is really putting in enough effort to try to get the most accurate counts of the virus as possible. They’re relying on students to inform them when they are testing positive, when most of them probably aren’t going to do that because they would miss out on other things. I also don’t think that they are doing the proper screenings that they should be doing in order to have in person classes. Not keeping track of everything can cause someone who is high risk to go to a class with someone who is positive and they might not even know what they’re doing.”
“Personally, I knew it was just a matter of time before COVID-19 would spike again. As college students we get into routine and tend to become more relaxed, thus the outbreak from last semester. Though, I am not happy that we reported zero cases on campus, when there were and everyone knew it. In a way it makes the school look like they are trying to hide something from its students and faculty and that is the opposite of being transparent.”
“This past year has likely been the most challenging this college has faced,” said Dr. Emily Kist, director of the Student Health Center. “I certainly have never experienced anything like this in my own career, and though the pandemic has been hard on every student, faculty and staff member here, I am very proud of how we have come together. Making this campus a safe place has required inexplicable effort and teamwork and I believe we have been successful.”
As Adrian College overcomes the second wave of COVID-19 on campus and the vaccine becomes distributed more widely, we cannot help but wonder when the pandemic will end, or at least become a small enough problem that we can return to what we once knew as “normal.”
The College World 