NC State University will close campus dorms, calling COVID situation ‘untenable’
N.C. State University will close its campus residence halls in response to continuing spread of COVID-19, the school announced Wednesday.
The closing of dorms comes less than a week after the university moved all undergraduate classes online, as clusters of coronavirus cases were reported. Graduate students continue to take classes in-person and the 300 living on campus can stay in dorms if they wish.
The university has now reported 24 clusters since classes began Aug. 10, including three new clusters on Wednesday.
The latest clusters include two additional residence halls, Bowen and Lee, and a 10th house in N.C. State’s Greek Village, the Kappa Alpha Order.
There have been 546 positive cases of COVID-19 at N.C. State since the pandemic began in March, according to the school’s dashboard.
Students to start moving out Thursday
Chancellor Randy Woodson said the school wanted to keep dorms open, but that the spread of the virus in the past few days forced the closing of most residence halls on campus.
“Our students want to be here,” Woodson said Wednesday during a news conference. “Our parents want our students to be here. But they expect us to create an environment where they can be safe. And that’s our No. 1 priority. And it’s become untenable to provide on-campus housing and meet that threshold of health and safety.”
Of the 24 clusters identified at N.C. State, six are in campus residence halls — Bragaw, Metcalf, Owen, Carroll, Lee and Bowen. There are also 10 clusters from fraternity or sorority houses in the university’s Greek Village, and eight clusters associated with apartment complexes off-campus.
Students living in dorms will be moved out over the next 11 days, starting Thursday, Aug. 27, and wrapping up Sunday, Sept. 6. Exemptions are being considered for students who wish to remain on campus due to a special circumstance.
Woodson said exemptions could be made for students who are facing travel restrictions, who have nowhere else to go, who have limited access to internet or who live with a relative considered high risk if exposed to the coronavirus.
The chancellor said the university is trying to drastically reduce the number of students on campus.
“We’re not where we want to be today, but we’re hopeful that by reducing our on-campus population, we can keep our community safe and slow the spread of this relentless virus,” Woodson said in a statement. “The vital work of the university will continue — to educate, to conduct groundbreaking research and to contribute to our world in meaningful ways.”
The move to online-only classes began Aug. 24 for undergraduates and will continue until the term ends. Most North Carolina colleges moved up the start of their fall semesters due to the coronavirus pandemic, looking to finish the term before Thanksgiving.
As of Wednesday, there are 111 students in quarantine or isolation in N.C. State’s university housing, plus 1,234 in quarantine or isolation off-campus. The students in quarantine on-campus will stay there, university officials said.
“We aren’t going to send people who are positive or possibly positive back out into the community,” said N.C. State spokesperson Mick Kulikowski.
‘Very, very few withdrawals’
When the university started classes earlier in the month, 7,400 students lived on campus. After N.C. State announced its move to online classes for undergraduates, that number dropped to 6,200.
Woodson acknowledged that some students will remain in Raleigh and simply seek housing off campus.
“They very well could, and that’s certainly not something that we have control over or are encouraging,” the chancellor said. “I know that there may be some students that may be seeking housing here in Raleigh, but they will still be subject to the executive order of the governor (limiting gatherings) and the community standards of the university.”
N.C. State pushed back its “census day” to this Friday, Aug. 28, which is the new deadline for students to withdraw from the university and receive a refund for most tuition fees. If students withdraw before Friday, they would receive a 90% refund. After that, the percentage of refunds will drop.
Woodson said Wednesday that N.C. State has seen few withdrawals since classes moved online for undergraduates.
“At this point in time, we’ve seen very, very few withdrawals,” Woodson said. “So the vast majority of our students are sticking with higher education and trying to get through this virus the way all of us are every day.”
So while tuition revenue is not taking a hit, the university will be refunding much of the housing and dining money students paid this semester, with refunds prorated based on how long students were on campus.
“We will have furloughs associated with those areas, because they’re people intensive, and we don’t have the revenue to support them,” Woodson said, adding that it’s unclear how many dining halls will stay open.
“That will depend somewhat on where the students are and where we settle out with numbers. We’re going to feed the students that are on campus. And obviously we want our students to be distributed so they can be socially distanced and we can reduce the density. That means that we likely are going to have to have more than one dining hall available, but we’ll have to work through all of those things once we understand how many students are left in housing.”
This story was originally published August 26, 2020 at 1:37 PM with the headline "NC State University will close campus dorms, calling COVID situation ‘untenable’."
