Colleges … Chaos!

In a recent Sunday paper a lot of space was devoted to how each of the four local colleges are handling getting the students back to in-person learning after subjecting their students to the close to useless Zoom  classes for the entirety of the last academic year.

I guess I am guilty of assuming that because we are dealing with colleges as opposed to dealing with pre-schools, that their approach would be more esoteric and learned. However, after reading how each college is going to handle this year’s inevitable quagmire, I was disappointed because there was no mention of how they are going to deal with the certain morass that is going to occur once the students are back on campus … back living in the dorms … back partying whether on or off campus.

In my way of thinking all colleges, not just those here locally, missed a golden opportunity last year. Instead of quarantining covld positive students to their rooms for weeks on end, would it not have been better to let the Covid positive individuals mix with other students in the same dorm or in the same apartment complex? If that plan had been followed, there would have been no change to last year’s practically useless Zoom classes. Individual students could have obviously taken Zoom classes in their rooms while in quarantine or not in quarantine. At this point colleges have no idea how many of their students actually already had Covid. These students probably have significantly better immunity than those who are now being forced to be vaccinated. What will these colleges do when all vaccinated individuals are going to need boosters, or when the inevitable positive Covid test shows up in a student who lives in a dorm or who has been attending multiple different in-person classes or parties. I predict chaos.

Already on “neighborhood watch” the Karens are complaining the there are college parties in their neighborhoods … “shame, shame, on you college students for partying!”

What about preschool? How did my granddaughter’s preschool handle this issue? If a kid was sick, the parents were told to keep him/her home. When the child returned there was no testing, and undoubtedly some of these young kids were Covid positive, and thus spread Covid positivity among other preschool students. (Have you ever seen a preschool classroom? Social distancing … impossible. Masks … taken on and off and for the most part not worn correctly).

While everyone agreed that 2020 was chaos, I predict more of the same for 2021-2 especially at colleges.

In my novella, The Keneally Chronicles, a town and it’s university handled Covid in a different way … in a way that avoided Zoom completely. If college presidents had read about the approach that this southwestern town and its college took, would the situation in present day colleges be different? When the inevitable college chaos occurs this year, perhaps some reflection should occur.

9/2/21

www.californiacontrarian.com

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