Changing COVID-19 regulations and where USD stands now

USD administrations address student questions in a forum with ASG

Celina Tebor / Editor in Chief / The USD Vista

Tyler Pugmire / News Editor / The USD Vista

As more vaccines become available and the University of San Diego’s COVID-19 case rates continue to change, the university has implemented new policies as well as provided updated information about the future of Spring 2021 and the following school year.

USD’s Associated Student Government held a forum with USD administrators on Tuesday, Feb. 23 to answer student questions. From the class of 2021’s graduation to COVID-19 vaccinations for students and faculty, this is what we know about Spring 2021 at USD and beyond.

COVID-19 testing and case rates

As of Tuesday, Feb. 23, USD had seven students in quarantine and 10 students in isolation. Those in quarantine may have been exposed to someone with COVID-19, while those in isolation are infected with the coronavirus. This was a sharp drop from a week ago, according to Cynthia Avery, Ed.D., assistant vice president of student life at USD, when all of Maher Hall’s and the Presidio Terrace Apartments’ quarantine housing had filled up, and 25-30 students were quarantined in a hotel outside USD. 

USD is now mandating that all students living in the USD housing contract (both on and off-campus) and off-campus students who may come on campus must receive weekly COVID-19 tests “due to the surge of positive COVID-19 cases among our students,” according to an email from Donald Godwin, Ph.D., assistant vice president and dean of students. This includes students living in the Loma Palisades and Pacific Ridge apartments through USD housing.

Rady Children’s Hospital conducts USD student testing in the Main Parking Structure. There is a San Diego County testing site in USD’s West Parking Structure.

If students don’t show up for their COVID-19 test or fail to schedule a test, “our team starts to follow up with them as soon as we get those lists, so we can push those students to go take another PCR test off-campus and submit those results back to us,” Director of Residential Administration Brandon McCreary said. “For those that don’t do that either, right now our method of accountability is locking students out of their rooms until they can provide us with a confirmation that they’ve taken a PCR test.”

If a student claims to test positive for COVID-19, they must submit their test results to the Student Health Center, Avery said. “Some students have claimed to have COVID multiple times, and asked for professor notifications and other accommodations,” she said.

Stop the Surge lifted

The “Stop the Surge” student directives were officially lifted on Feb. 25, after cases fell significantly in comparison to the start of the semester. For comparison, there were 169 cases reported in the first week after students returned to campus for the spring semester, and there were 23 confirmed cases in the final week of February. 

Outdoor dining became available once again on campus on March 1. Effective immediately, students are allowed to leave campus for nonessential reasons, and classes that were previously meeting on campus can return to their hybrid format of instruction. 

Student organizations are to continue in their remote setting or stay consistent with their student organization guidelines. 

Vaccinations

USD has set up its own vaccination site on campus in order to help facilitate the process of vaccinating its employees. Avery stated that the university had asked the county for 900 vaccines, but only received 100 as of Feb. 23. 

All employees and student employees will eventually be eligible to receive vaccines, including Residential Assistants, as long as students are on campus. As for other student employees, Avery said they will be on the list to receive vaccines but because of necessary student-to-student contact, residential students may be getting priority. 

In regards to vaccinating the entire student population, the expectation for the Fall 2021 semester is that if vaccines are readily available to the general public, all students will be required to receive a vaccine if they are to come on campus, just as they would for any other vaccine, according to Avery.

Academic updates

USD seems to have no plans in terms of bringing back the option to take any class on a pass/fail basis for the Spring 2021 semester. Interim Vice Provost and Communication Studies Professor Roger Pace, Ph.D. said that after an analysis was conducted around the pass/fail option, the university saw that grade point averages of Fall 2020 were higher than those of  Spring 2020, which was the semester where students could choose to take classes in a pass/fail format.

This decision also stems from the fact that graduate programs and medical schools have changed course, and have been telling universities that a student with an entire pass/fail semester on their transcript will look less attractive for admittance in comparison to others that have letter grades, Pace said.

Fall 2020 had the highest grade point average in the last four semesters for all undergraduate students, according to Pace. As students went remote, the workload has made it increasingly difficult to stay on top of assignments for some students, but Pace said that the administration has communicated with faculty to alter their syllabi in order to accommodate more students.

After there was an increase in academic integrity violations in the Fall 2020 semester, some department chairs have encouraged their faculty to use the Respondus Lockdown browser more frequently. Pace said that if these violations go down, administrators can worry less about using these “intrusive” features, as Pace described the browser. 

Justin Daus, vice president of Associated Student Government, elaborated that “a blanket solution to the Lockdown Browser issue doesn’t seem feasible at this point in time.” He also noted that for students concerned about their privacy, faculty should be able to accommodate students on a case-by-case basis. 

As for the Respondus Lockdown Browser, there are no plans to remove its use for the coming semester, and the concerns about privacy have been looked at by administrators, according to Pace.

In regards to the probability of professors who are attempting to return to the classroom to teach in person, Pace said that “If a professor decided to change their fully remote class to hybrid, it probably could be done … but we haven’t had many of those requests.” Pace also noted that as the county goes through different tiers, keeping campus density low could be an issue that arises. 

Other updates come in the form of the future of the academic calendar, and Pace said that “the current plans are to move back to the more traditional calendar.” This would see a start of the Fall 2021 semester on the day after Labor Day, and carried into the middle of December. 

There has also been an extension of USD’s acceptance of online transfer credits for students who take courses at other universities. It is unknown if this will extend past the summer of 2021.

Commencement

USD has not confirmed plans for the class of 2021’s commencement ceremony, but Pace gave insight into the factors that need to be considered in order to have an in-person celebration.

Pace, who is the co-chair of USD’s commencement committee, said USD President James T. Harris III, D.Ed. is “anxious, if at all possible, to hold some sort of in-person celebration.”

The possibility of an in-person commencement ceremony depends on what tier California is in: the best USD can hope for is the yellow tier, Pace said. That allows for 25% of an outdoor facility to be used. 

Pace said there are “worrisome signs” for the possibility of an in-person commencement, including the slow rollout of vaccines and continued spread of the virus. Additionally, USD saw a large surge of COVID-19 cases two weeks after students returned to campus in Spring 2021, and Pace said those rising cases could spell a warning for the possibility of in-person graduation: the university is concerned about a similar situation following spring break, which ends April 5. If there was a rise in cases two weeks after returning from spring break, that would leave less than a month before commencement for USD to control the surge.

Even if students are able to proceed with some sort of in-person commencement, it “would be very scaled back,” Pace said. Tickets will be extremely limited: one or two, or even none.

COVID-19 violations

USD learns about 30 to 50% of COVID-19 safety violations through Public Safety’s anonymous reporting form, which can be found on its website, according to Avery. In Fall 2020, she said there were 163 alleged health and safety violations.

“What we can do with that report depends on the specificity of the report and any evidence that is submitted with it,” Avery said. Examples of evidence are photos or screenshots with specific student names.

Students who are reported will go through USD’s student conduct process if USD has enough information and could receive a wide range of sanctions, between a warning and suspension. 

Reports concerning fraternities and sororities are all forwarded to Fraternity and Sorority Life for investigation by Associate Director of FSL, DJ Mahoney.

Avery said multiple athletic teams at USD have been through quarantine. Some have gone through quarantine several times. 

Housing

When USD announced its “Stop the Surge” directives on Feb. 12 following a 250% increase of cases since the end of the fall semester, President Harris delivered a vague yet assertive message to students that “our numbers in the past few weeks have grown to levels that if they continue on this trajectory, will require us to make some tough decisions about the future of the spring semester,” hinting that students living on campus may be sent home. 

USD’s cases have since declined, and the “Stop the Surge” directives were lifted on Thursday, Feb. 25. McCreary confirmed in Tuesday’s meeting that there is not currently a plan to shut down on-campus housing, but warned that this could change, “based on the president’s message … there is still potential and possibility that we could move that direction if things continue to get worse.”

USD instituted a tuition freeze for the 2021-2022 school year, but Avery said the university will follow through with “necessary increases” in dining and housing plans.

Housing applications for the following year typically open in February, but USD has decided to delay the application process, McCreary said. He said USD hopes to open the applications in mid-March, but they could be delayed to spring break. 

“Our hope is that we can return to a fairly typical year from a housing occupancy perspective, with singles and doubles in housing,” he said.

Camino and Founders Halls, currently under construction, are on track to welcome first-year students back to their dorm rooms in the fall, and McCreary said USD hopes to reestablish its residency requirement for first- and second-year students.

As with everything, however, housing availability will depend on county and state guidelines, McCreary said.