Students leaving dorms pose risk, whether moving home or staying in college towns
Amber Silver, a freshman at N.C. State University, spent all summer buying new stuff to decorate her dorm on campus. About a month later, she was packing it up to drive back home to Nashville, N.C., and finish the semester online.
The university announced a COVID-19 cluster in her dorm last week, so she got tested just before leaving campus Friday.
“I feel like it’s inevitable to come across someone with COVID-19,” Silver said. “I am worried that I have contracted it and don’t have symptoms yet.”
Silver is one of the thousands of students who are leaving college campuses after a few weeks living in residence halls. Silver canceled her housing contract a few hours before N.C. State announced it would be closing dorms as it transitions to online classes. But now, she’s scared to go back home and spread coronavirus to her parents or her brother.
“I don’t want it to affect them in any way,” Silver said. “They’re such hard workers and so I’d hate potentially for it to affect their health and their jobs.”
The universities, local health officials and the state health department advised students moving home to get a COVID-19 test and to self-quarantine for 14 days, regardless of the test result. The quarantine is particularly if a cluster of five or more coronavirus cases was identified in their residence hall, apartment or fraternity or sorority house.
“All students that are members of campuses with widespread transmission should quarantine for 14 days — whether they staying on campus, in off campus housing, or moving back home to prevent the spread,” N.C. Department of Health and Human Services spokesperson Catie Armstrong said in a statement.
There is a general concern about students inadvertently spreading the virus when they move from one location to another. But several health and university officials said students should take precautions to mitigate that spread, including washing their hands, wearing a mask and practicing social distancing.
Silver said she hung out with multiple students who now have COVID-19 and others who went to fraternity parties, which she didn’t know at time.
“The way the people I met went about telling other people that they had COVID was reckless and inconsiderate,” Silver said. “They just posted on social media that they had it and they were like ‘you should go get tested.’
“It was very nonchalant and it’s a big deal, so I feel like they should’ve taken it seriously,” she said.
Silver wore a mask as she and her mom packed up the car to move out Friday and drove back home, where she plans to self-quarantine for two weeks.
Traveling back home across the state
N.C. State students began moving out of theirs dorms by appointment Thursday and have until Sept. 6 to vacate the residence halls on campus.
Students currently in on-campus quarantine or isolation must be cleared by Student Health Services before moving out. Other students can apply for waivers to remain in on-campus housing.
NCSU Chancellor Randy 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 News & Observer previously reported.
The students in isolation or quarantine on campus, who have tested positive or might’ve been exposed, can also stay in those dorm rooms.
At UNC-Chapel Hill, students were told to cancel their housing contracts and move out by Aug. 30, with exceptions similar to those at N.C. State. About 1,000 UNC students with approved hardships are currently living in campus dorms and at Granville Towers as of Monday, according to the university. But that number could change as UNC processes move out activity from the weekend and works with students who have not checked out yet.
“We certainly recognize that students ... transitioning to other parts of the state and the country, we all need to take prudent and responsible precautions to ensure we’re not spreading it even more broadly,” said Jonathan Sauls, UNC’s associate vice chancellor for student affairs.
“There was not an expectation that all students would leave Chapel Hill,” he said. “But we have provided concurrent recommendations as part of that move out process to ensure that students are thinking about it from a health and safety standpoint beyond just the living arrangement.”
Whether moving off campus locally or back home, college students were advised to self quarantine for 14 days because they can be a asymptomatic carrier. UNC also expanded testing so that students who want a test prior to departure could get one.
“Regardless of the geographic location where students are located, whether that’s home or elsewhere in the country or right here in Chapel Hill, we need everybody to be doing those things so that collectively we can get on the other side of this virus,” Sauls said.
UNC is asking students to leave their campus dorms, but is not encouraging undergraduate students to then move into local off-campus apartments, according to UNC’s Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs Amy Johnson. She said the university is concerned for the safety of students and Chapel Hill residents.
“Similar to our experience on campus, we are aware of the virus spreading among our students living off campus,” Johnson said. “For the health and well being of your student and our community, we strongly encourage that, if it is safe and feasible for them to do so, students should plan to return home for the fall semester and study remotely in order to curb the spread.”
About two-thirds of UNC students typically live off campus, according to Sauls. And while that number may increase now, the concerns about students not following guidelines about socializing or wearing masks have not changed. And the expectation and enforcement of those rules are the same as they were before UNC’s announcements about online classes and de-densifying campus housing.
Students staying in town
While some students opted to go home once dorms closed and classes moved online, others scrambled to find apartments to sub-lease near campus.
Silver’s decision to cancel her housing contract and move home was about her health, but also about saving money. She knew she could get a pro-rated refund for housing and dining and that going home was cheaper than trying to find an apartment in Raleigh.
“Going into an apartment never really crossed my mind, but I have heard a lot of people getting an apartment and try to house with different people now off campus,” Silver said. “That might help with the cases and preventing them from bringing it back to their families, but it’s not just an option for me.”
Silver said the university can’t prevent people from getting apartments in town and that if students just move in with each other cases will continue to rise.
“The only thing it’ll prevent is them giving it to their families, but obviously more students might get it now if they have parties and act irresponsibly,” Silver said.
Valerie Nguyen, a junior at UNC, planned to live in a sorority house this fall, but signed a lease for an apartment in Chapel Hill at the last minute, about a week before school started. She never considered going back home to northern Virginia once cases started to rise and UNC announced classes would move online.
“I just have not the best home life,” Nguyen said. “The first time when we had to go home it was not conducive to my learning.”
Beyond the not-so-great academic environment, Nguyen said students also probably don’t want to give up the freedom that comes with being in college and the ability to be on your own schedule. They also don’t want to be cooped up in their house with their parents, she said.
Some of her friends are living in a house with 10 people, and others are subleasing apartments, she said.
“A lot of people aren’t being as careful in their communities,” Nguyen said. “People with COVID-19 are still having apartment parties and not wearing masks when they’re out.
“I think it’s going to get worse before it gets better,” she said.
Concern from health officials statewide
As UNC, N.C. State and East Carolina University students transition to remote learning and move out of residence halls, many will be returning to counties across the state and states across the nation.
The top places where North Carolina students at those universities come from include Wake, Mecklenburg, Orange, Guilford, Durham, Union, Cumberland and Forsyth counties, Fall 2019 enrollment numbers show. The largest portion of out of state students at those schools come from Virginia, Florida, New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Maryland.
N.C. State’s class of 2023, who are now sophomores, represents 97 of North Carolina’s 100 counties, 40 of the 50 states and 20 countries. About one-third of those came from rural counties.
That same class at UNC came from 54 countries, 45 states and Washington D.C., and 97 NC counties. About 36% of all North Carolina students in UNC’s class of 2023 are from rural counties.
In fall 2019, the ECU student body came from all 100 North Carolina counties, 47 states plus Washington D.C. and 72 countries.
“With the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and current transmission rates, there is a risk for transmission everywhere you go,” Union County Public Health Director Dennis Joyner said in a statement.
That’s why students need to quarantine and follow the preventative measures.
“We share the concern that students leaving campus could spread the virus when they return to their homes,” Orange County spokesperson Todd McGee said in a statement. “Regardless of whether students stay or leave, we continue to emphasize the need to practice social distancing, follow all regulations for large gatherings, wear masks and wash your hands regularly.”
Wake County spokesperson Leah Holdren said if students don’t follow those guidelines, “there is the ripple effect potential of spreading.”
Holdren said anyone who has been exposed or may potentially have COVID-19 should get tested, monitor their symptoms and remain in isolation for as long as instructed. Wake County’s drive-thru testing at the Sunnybrook Building parking deck is open to students and is free and doesn’t require insurance.
When deciding whether to return home, students and families should consider who lives in the house, how sick a student might be, whether they’re able to drive and what the terms of a lease might be, according to Gibbie Harris, Mecklenburg County public health director.
“We are providing guidance when contacted based on the individual situation,” Harris said in a statement.
She said students should limit contact with family members, especially those at high risk, quarantine for 14 days and get tested, especially if they were exposed to someone who tested positive or who has been involved in high risk activity while at school.
If students move back home and become symptomatic, they should tell their healthcare provider they returned from a college or university campus in the past two weeks, according to Cumberland County Health Director Jennifer Green. That will help health departments across the state identify clusters linked to institutions, even as students are in transition, she said.
The county has also asked local providers to collect accurate information about the student’s “home” and current location when testing so that cases get assigned to the appropriate county, Green said. That way counties can work together on case investigations and contact tracing.
“Doing these things will help us prevent spread of the virus even as students are moving to and from campuses,” Green said.
Experience was worth the risk
At move-in, Amber Silver’s mom, Gloria said, she prayed that they wouldn’t have to move all of Amber’s stuff out in a month. But even if they knew that was coming, both said they still would’ve moved into the dorms..
“I’m still grateful that I had the opportunity to experience college for three weeks,” Silver said. “It wasn’t a long time, but I got the dorm experience, roommate experience, campus experience for a little while.”
She said it’s unfortunate that everyone has to go home due to some irresponsible students.
“I just want to stay safe, even if that is from home and not from campus,” Silver said.
It was chaotic few days with all the announcements, and she’s worried now that she could potentially have COVID-19 and that people are spreading it, but she wouldn’t change it.
“This experience has been one of a kind,” she said.
And if students can return to campus in the spring, Silver said she will be “jumping at the opportunity” to come back to N.C. State.
This story was originally published August 31, 2020 at 3:36 PM with the headline "Students leaving dorms pose risk, whether moving home or staying in college towns."
