Cal Poly’s reopening is grounded in science — and reduces COVID-19 risk for SLO residents
As Cal Poly gears up for its first face-to-face classes in more than six months, tensions are understandably elevated. We are still in the midst of a pandemic, universities across the nation are closing their campuses due to COVID-19 outbreaks, and our local community expects an influx of thousands of young people eager to return to college life. This is why Cal Poly’s plan to reopen has been intentional, carefully designed and grounded in science.
This novel coronavirus pandemic will likely be an ongoing public health issue for the next several years. While vaccines and therapeutics are being rapidly developed and tested, it will be quite some time before their efficacy, access and acceptability is known. A gradual and safe reopening of the campus to allow for the type of instruction that cannot easily be replicated online is essential. We are responsible for training the scientists and engineers who will help us conquer COVID-19 and future pandemics. We cannot delay their education indefinitely.
To be clear, variance in risk tolerance must be respected. We know the risks of complications and death from COVID-19 are not equally distributed. Reasonable and equitable accommodations must be offered to students and employees who cannot come to campus. But if one does choose to take an essential, in-person class, work, or teach on campus, they will be stepping foot onto a very different Cal Poly.
From obligatory masks and sanitation stations to engineering controls and ubiquitous signage, the campus has been transformed. Incoming students are required to show proof of a negative test in the past 72 hours or get tested at Campus Health and Wellbeing.
Daily “green checkmark” hall passes will be issued using an online screening tool. And since many people are asymptomatic and don’t recognize they have the virus, the university will conduct testing to assess how widespread COVID-19 is in the Cal Poly community. This will continue throughout the term.
Finally, epidemiological models have been carefully designed specifically for Cal Poly’s reopening and are constantly being monitored and revised as the results of baseline and surveillance testing become available.
We fully realize there is no such thing as a zero-risk scenario. We will have new infections. There will be outbreaks. The important question is: How will Cal Poly manage the situation?
When new cases are identified, San Luis Obispo County Public Health Department protocol will be activated, along with Cal Poly’s own exposure investigation procedures. Students living in residence halls who test positive for COVID-19 will be offered supported isolation accommodations in one of the universities 177 designated single rooms, other local facilities or the Cal Poly alternate care site with 165 beds. Throughout the isolation period, students will be supported with check-in calls, delivered meals and services and academic support.
Lectures will not be held at Cal Poly this fall. About 200 labs (11% of all courses) of less than 35 students will be offered in-person. Mitigation measures in those classes will include engineering controls, advanced HVAC systems, physical distancing and obligatory face coverings. A Cal Poly classroom in the time of COVID-19 is about the safest public place you can be.
Canceling in-person classes will not decrease risk to students, faculty or the community. It will, however, eliminate the only applied academic experience for nearly 5,000 students.
Like many other college towns around the country, Cal Poly is a destination campus. Students consider San Luis Obispo their home, and university surveys indicate that at least 65% and up to 80% would return and live in the community whether or not their classes were online. This aligns with data from other universities.
This is why it is important to repopulate the dorms. The alternative to safely opening the residence halls is to compel an additional 5,000 students into off-campus housing, increasing community density — and risk. Keeping students in their single-occupancy dorms reduces Cal Poly student residency in the local community, which is in everybody’s best interest.
Like classrooms, the residence halls have been outfitted for risk mitigation, and resident advisers are trained in COVID-19 prevention and will be empowered to promote public health education among their residents. Living and studying on the Cal Poly campus presents no greater risk, and perhaps even lower, than going about your daily business anywhere in America today.
COVID-19 will be present in our population for years and maybe forever. We must continue to ground our decisions in science — and not panic. The suggestion that Cal Poly remain “closed” belies the reality of this virus.
Kevin Ferguson is a board-certified pathologist and a Fellow of the American Society for Clinical Pathology. Aydin Nazmi is an epidemiologist and professor at Cal Poly. Trees Ritter is an infectious disease specialist and a Fellow of the Infectious Diseases Society of America. All three serve in an advisory capacity to Cal Poly for COVID-19 response and preparedness.
This story was originally published September 10, 2020 at 5:02 PM.