Editor’s note: This commentary is by Wayne Senville, of Burlington, who now retired. He is a former member of the Burlington Planning Commission and the City’s Development Review Board. He served for 23 years as editor of the Planning Commissioners Journal.
I remain quite surprised and distressed that the University of Vermont is planning to proceed with on-campus classes this fall. I strongly believe that UVM is an incredible resource for our state, and for the city of Burlington. At the same time, we have to recognize that UVM students are, for the most part, young adults — some just out of high school.
While I am sure UVM through its Fall 2020 Advisory Committee process tried its best to “thread the needle” with a workable plan for students to return, I think having students on campus is almost inevitably going to result in many infections, and possibly deaths, to students, faculty, staff, and — equally important — Burlington residents.
It is unfortunate that UVM has failed to follow the lead of a number of other major universities that have decided to provide classes exclusively online this fall.
I recommend that VTDigger readers take a few minutes to look at an op-ed by Dr. Laurence Steinberg recently published in The New York Times: “Expecting Students to Play It Safe if Colleges Reopen Is a Fantasy.”
Steinberg, a professor of psychology at Temple University, notes that:
“A number of American colleges and universities have decided to bring students back to campus this fall, believing they can diminish the risk of coronavirus transmission if everyone wears masks, uses hand sanitizer and social distances. … Most types of risky behavior — reckless driving, criminal activity, fighting, unsafe sex and binge drinking, to name just a few — peak during the late teens and early 20s. Moreover, interventions designed to diminish risk-taking in this age group, such as attempts to squelch binge drinking on campus, have an underwhelming track record.”
Steinberg predicts that “college and university reopening strategies under consideration will work for a few weeks before their effectiveness fizzles out.”
Where will UVM — and the rest of us who live in Burlington and nearby towns — be left if several weeks after reopening there is a surge in infections and hospitalizations?
Since June 1, a number of students have already returned to neighborhoods near the UVM campus. In walking and driving through my neighborhood I have seen young people getting together in groups without any social distancing or use of face masks. This is, of course, not very surprising. There’s little doubt that, despite the best efforts UVM will try to make, the situation is going to get worse when thousands of students descend on Burlington neighborhoods and downtown when they return to campus in late August. The UVM campus is not surrounded by a moat with drawbridges; it is deeply embedded within Burlington.
If UVM decides to proceed with reopening, Gov. Phil Scott, Burlington city officials, and state legislators should demand that UVM administrators, at a minimum, release specific criteria for what number of infections of students, faculty, and staff would trigger closing down the campus — and make information on number of infections publicly available on a daily basis.
This is the least that can be done to assure UVM neighbors and others that the school will promptly shut down if a new wave of the Covid virus hits after the campus reopens two months from now.
