Letter to the Editors: Student Leaders Raised their Concerns about University’s Handling of COVID-19

To whom it may concern:  

This is an open letter, composed by students at St. Lawrence University, regarding our concerns and frustrations with the handling of COVID-19 thus far this semester. We would like to begin with acknowledging that we understand this pandemic is frequently changing and there are no solid guidelines on how to approach it, however we are thoroughly disappointed in how this University repealed almost all the cautionary protocols which kept students and staff safe in the previous year.  

Issues:  

This problem is rooted in the transition from using the Academic Planning component of the Campus Safe Monitoring Committee (CSMC), which included teaching faculty, to only Senior Staff. We believe that the CSMC should have included faculty members from more aspects of campus life, including dining staff and professors, in addition to student leaders, as we are most directly affected by these policies and have valuable input. Furthermore, we request that you consider broadening the committee to these groups. Asking a select few for their input after problems arise is simply not sufficient, especially when our concerns seemed to be brushed aside and our questions are met with dodgy answers.  

As COVID-19 cases continue to rise on our campus, we have seen two very disappointing stances taken by the CSMC. The first is that this outbreak is simply due to reckless student behavior. This is not only offensive to students who followed the very loose and liberal guidelines and rules set but shows that the school is unwilling to admit accountability. The Delta variant has been in the US since June and has been known to be almost three times more contagious than the original strain in addition to infecting fully vaccinated individuals. It is baffling to us that we began the semester with no pre-arrival testing, no quarantine period, and most importantly no solid plan on how to handle a large outbreak. Moreover, as those who attended the mandatory Theme House and Greek Life meeting in the chapel can attest to, we were encouraged to go out and have as much fun as we want. We did not receive any warnings or guidelines regarding social outings and COVID but were instead informed that we could use security as bouncers. Last week, there were numerous large gatherings that school officials witnessed but did not intervene. You cannot blame students for using the freedom granted to them.  

Our second source of frustration, as the select students who were invited to the CSMC meeting on Wednesday night experienced, we were informed that is up to the students to ensure our own safety, as the school has no interest in reenacting any of the mandates from the previous semester, which were highly successful. We as student leaders will do our best, but this task should not fall on our shoulders. We are already underpaid and overworked. We already have residents to check in on. We are members of EMS. We have our own wellbeing to consider. We are pleading for the school to make a stern move and bring back mandates. The school needs to act soon. We need a plan, and that plan needs to be clearly conveyed to every member of campus life. To be blunt, as many students in the CSMC meeting can attest to and have said, it feels like this university is treating COVID as a benign virus of which it is not to immunocompromised students, students who are unable to get vaccinated, the Canton community, and more.  

Finally, we want to raise concern about the ableist and classist attitude that this University has taken this year. Proceeding with all in-person classes forced every student to decide if they were willing to risk being exposed to COVID or to not return to St. Lawrence. This policy implies that the school is more interested in being fully back to normal than protecting the students and their families. Even though it has always been the University’s policy to send home any COVID positive case who resides within 500 miles, this is simply not accessible to many students. Those who do not have a car on campus either must get a ride and put another person at risk or pay their own money to quarantine in a hotel. Some people will be returning to immunocompromised family members, communities that have had dwindling COVID infections, or households that are simply not arranged in a way where they can isolate themselves. This means that your policy is potentially putting entire families and communities at risk. Even if these individuals can return home safely, this does not mean that everyone will have a conductive learning environment. Despite a year of offered remote learning, you cannot assume that everyone has access to the internet or even a quiet place to work. We understand that you were only able to put aside a handful of quarantine beds, but this approach is not accessible, not accommodating, and simply not working.  

We hope you receive this letter with an open mind and consider it in St. Lawrence’s approach to COVID-19 in future instances. The stress and paranoia caused by the University’s reaction to COVID-19 is not only unhealthy but unproductive in a living/learning environment. We would also like to mention that we are not putting blame on a single person or a group of people for this mismanagement, as this is a systemic problem in the hierarchy of St. Lawrence. A single person admitting guilt or resigning is not what we are looking for. We are looking for transparency, student leaders’ involvement in handling the University’s COVID procedures along with staff more impacted by the procedures than Senior Staff, and a safer experience on campus. 

9/3 Update:  

At the time of this writing, the University has just moved to Code Orange, which came with a few reforms to our COVID procedures, but not enough. We do not understand why employees of St. Lawrence are not being mandated to take COVID tests, which the student body is. We also question why we are not at red operating status, as the COVID-19 Alert Status page on the University’s website writes that red is when there is “21+ confirmed student cases and contacts in exposure quarantine on campus or at home; or 61% or more of quarantine beds used (7 or above)” (Link Here). We currently have 108 active student cases, according to the COVID-19 Dashboard, and in the email released today to the student body the University writes that “Currently, our on-campus quarantine space is at capacity”. If this information is out of date, why was it not updated before the start of the school year? It feels as if the University is not acting proactively and is instead only acting after a significant outbreak has occurred.  

We understand that monitoring and updating the COVID Dashboard, making these challenging decisions, and sending frequent updates to the campus community about these changes is a difficult and strenuous task. Therefore, we are urging the CSMC to allow us to aid in doing so by hearing and incorporating student, faculty, and staff input. On the St. Lawrence website, we define ourselves as a “collaborative community of learners who value thought and action.” This situation has given us an opportunity to prove this to be true, but we cannot do so unless our thoughts are attributed enough value to be turned into action.  

9/6 Update:  

As we are writing this letter, St. Lawrence President Kate Morris has sent out an email to facstaff and students, which we strongly disagree with. Writing that:  

“Many Laurentians have expressed concern or fear that we are not taking enough action to curtail the spread of the virus, advocating that we should put the campus community in a strict lock down for two weeks, requiring remote learning and restricting students to their rooms. Even more people have expressed concern or anger that we are doing too much—that we should test only those who are actively ill, stop isolating students who test positive, and accept that we will now be living with the virus rather than containing it.”  

This feels like both a false equivalency and a strawman. Equating students who believe that St. Lawrence is not doing enough with the vocal minority of students who frankly don’t care about other’s wellbeing is quite offensive to us. Acting as if both sides are equally bad and that we should settle in the middle is a microcosm of St. Lawrence’s attitude towards reform on this campus. When one side argues concerns in good faith and the other side takes issue with anything that side brings forward, equating each and deciding to compromise and instead making both sides unhappy is deeply frustrating. The administration needs to make a choice between actively reforming the COVID-19 Procedures on campus and both encouraging students to party and blaming them for doing so. It’s not just that we disagree with the way the email was phrased, but that this feels another case of what St. Lawrence University does best: placing optics over people.