Current circumstances have led to colleges cancelling spring break during the coronavirus pandemic. Due to the outbreak and the persistence of the COVID-19 pandemic taking its toll across nations, some schools are making the hard decision of revising their calendar to prevent cases of the virus outbreak on campus.
Michigan had earlier revised their school calendar regarding this situational ethics and Kentucky officials this week also decided to play things safe and revised the school calendars to prevent the spread of the virus on campus. The officials emphasized that ”the revised calendar creates a condensed semester in which students will remain engaged in coursework on campus, rather than potentially travelling to other regions and returning to Lexington, which would increase the risk of spreading COVID-19.”
Data says spring break travel increased COVID-19 spread
Kansas State Provost, Chuck Taber had also earlier pointed out that it was necessary to reduce risk by ”reducing travel mass between K-state campuses” following the decision of colleges cancelling spring break. Due to the recent studies that have been carried out, it turns out that the concerns are valid. Taking a close look at the data of the June study carried out by Vanderbilt and Ball state, the research revealed that a high volume of studetns who went on spring break ended up bringing back COVID-19 to their campuses.
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Provost Nancy Brickhouse at Baylor, explained to the students regarding the school’s decision not to take spring break, “preventing the COVID-19 outbreak like we saw across the country last spring was a priority to contain the spread of the virus”.
Other schools like Purdue and Carnegie Mellon are adopting the idea of several “reading days” or “break days” all through their spring’s academic calendar to give the students and faculty a breather.
Academic calendars are also condensing fall break
Academic calendars are also condensing the academic session to the extent that fall breaks are also being cancelled.
There were also cases where the allocated days for spring breaks are now tracked into the winter recess. Medical expert warned about a “twindemic” of both COVID-19 and flu. So, delaying the semester would be the ideal thing to set in motion.
Wisconsin Governor, Tony Evers earlier said this week that he had supported UW-Madisson’s decision in colleges cancelling spring break during a time like this. He notes the risk of students being exposed on campus. The Governor also made mention of the expected vaccine which will be on pharmacies or doctor’s offices hopefully mid-year.
“For our country to vaccinate 300 million people, it’s not going to happen overnight,” Evers said. UW-Madison and other colleges cancelling spring break is a “wise step on their part.”
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