Maintenance and utilities will be lower, but not zero.
However, another revenue issue that colleges with dorms will have is that they will get less or no revenue from renting out the dorms in the summer as hotels for conferences, due to the dropoff in hotel bookings generally. And then if they need to do distance education next fall, they will have empty dorm buildings again…
@twoinanddone. I look at getting a refund as a bonus but don’t actually automatically expect it. Maybe the universities have some sort of insurance for this. I can see some small lacs on the brink of closure over this. Even a school like Michigan with huge reserves is “considering” it… It will be made up on the back end at some point and that could be worse. My daughter goes to a small Lac. This could have severe affects on it. If she gets a credit w might just donate it back. I understand that this might not be possible for everyone to do. It’s a time of crisis and even though institutions have plans for disasters, no one really expects to use them.
I feel very sad for the owner of the motel where we are staying this weekend. It’s a great little place, near the campus, and the owner is so nice. He told us that the college’s potentially cancelling the graduation and the alumni weekend will be horrible for his motel. He said that they struggle through the winter months and always count on the graduation and alumni weekend, when they have huge numbers of guests. (Businesses in college towns and all over the country will be under severe economic stress after all this.)
Well, at least it is 100% full with no vacancies this weekend, as every parent from the northeast is here to pack up and pick up their child!
As I was getting my lunch in the student dining hall yesterday, handling levers and scooping up buffet food with spoons that many students would use after I used them, I was thinking that the kids on this rural campus would have been less likely to get the virus had they stayed in this nice rural area, instead of spreading out all over the world, to more hard-hit areas… and also having a ton of parents from these hard-hit areas arrive on campus all at once!
Colleges are going to face some financial challenges. Parents are hoping for refunds for room and board for this term. Some also will be looking for need based financial aid reconsideration because their incomes will be significantly reduced or their jobs eliminated.
Where will all that money come from?
@thumper1 , couldn’t agree more. I sit on the board of a small, liberal arts college. This is not a fun time for us. The college was not prepared to go online and is now scrambling to do so. Financially, it is going to be devastating.
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As I was getting my lunch in the student dining hall yesterday, handling levers and scooping up buffet food with spoons that many students would use after I used them, I was thinking that the kids on this rural campus would have been less likely to get the virus had they stayed in this nice rural area, instead of spreading out all over the world, to more hard-hit areas… and also having a ton of parents from these hard-hit areas arrive on campus all at once!
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Actually, your story illustrates why it’s so important for these kids to get home; I think it’s precisely opposite of your conclusion. Coronavirus either already has or would reach that college. The use of buffets with those shared spoons for scooping, etc, and other forms of preparing and serving food for large groups of people is not conducive to shutting this virus down. Communal living/dorm life is comparable to cruise ships in many ways. There are shared bathrooms with many people, buffets, etc. A Petri dish! Get these kids home before the campuses have too many cases, then the kids need to hunker down in their houses with just their small immediate families. Cook your own food. If the kids stayed on campus, given their communal living lifestyles, it would spread far more quickly.
I can actually see both sides. My son right now is staying put till next week but he’s in a campus apartment not a dorm. He cooks his own meals etc. Couldn’t find toilet paper yesterday so told him to get kleenex or similar for now… Lol… We don’t want him to be the last one left but he said people are around but less then usual. He might be better just staying since he will be able to study better there. I might go and get stuff from his dorm just to start the move (and bring him toliet paper if he can’t find any… Lol next week. We are going to discuss this week to draw up a plan
Several Massachusetts colleges that had intended to keep their dorms open have been “advised” by the Massachusetts public health authorities to vacate their campuses ASAP.
^ it will likely move to a mandate in short order.
Perhaps I’m just in denial, but I can’t imagine that life will shut down for six months. China seems to be getting back to normal.
For how many months will we hope to flatten the curve? We’re past containment, and I support the efforts to mitigate the spread, but there will be a tipping point where the collateral damage from these efforts will outweigh the benefits.
If we’re still at a point next year where schools remain closed, I think many, many Americans will truly be in survival mode.
@TrendaLeigh See, I’m the opposite. I’m not usually a pessimist, but I just can’t see how this is gonna turn around in the short term. China is not really getting back to normal, unless you call having your temperature taken in order to eat in a restaurant, and then being seated 1 to a table and at least 6 feet apart, normal. And AFAIK, most businesses are still shut down in China.
There won’t be a vaccine broadly available for at least a year. So, if/when the social distancing is lifted, won’t the infections just pick up again? At least we have China as the leading indicator. So we should have a better idea of what’s down the road, as things progress.
I really don’t think it helps to be alarmist. Even Fauci is on TV saying we should be able to be at peak by early May. I’m betting more stringent measures are coming with all non-essential retail closing. Pretty soon, there may be no where for people to gather.
The whole world is gathering data on the virus. We will know fairly soon how deadly it really is. That will result in more exact suggestions on who needs to be most careful and which parts of regular life can come back. We just need to get testing underway in a big way and keep it from spreading when we can.
New info is coming fast and furious every day. The next six weeks seem to be crucial and we should have more answers by then.
Regarding colleges closing dorms…
At many residential colleges, many students (particularly upper class and graduate / professional school students) live nearby in off campus housing, often in similar density (e.g. fraternities, sororities, co-ops, private dorms, etc.). So, while closing the dorms may seem like the college is doing something, it may not get most of the students out of high density living situations.
Most schools that are closing dorms are also going on-line so even in cases where kids live in off-campus housing they can either go home to their parents or self-isolate in their apartments.
Most dorms don’t have proper cooking facilities and many have shared bathrooms. IMO closing dorms and getting as many kids as possible off campus is. smart.
ETA- My freshman lives off-campus at a school where the majority of kids do as well. She lives in a quad. Three kids have gone home and the fourth has stayed in the apartment. That roommate will have the space all to herself and won’t have to worry about being infected by one of the others.
I live adjacent to Northwestern. They have two confirmed cases of Covid-19 of staff members. I personally witness two shouting matches between parents and students Friday. Students insisting on not fully moving out of dorms and parents demanding total move out. (I believe they still have another week before spring break starts but I’m not sure). I also overheard a number of groups of students living off campus saying they are staying in their apartments and not returning home.
I think students, all over, don’t want to leave their schools. Tough times.
I expect online classes to become the norm at all colleges, at least for the next few weeks and mostly likely until this summer. Colleges, even the ones at remote locations, don’t want to take the risk of keeping all their students on campus. It probably makes sense for students to go home if they live within driving distance and not in a virus hot spot. However, for other students who have to take a flight to go home, it may not be such a good idea. The chance of getting infected increases significantly with the current situation at many airports around the country.
While not the main focus of these forums or the colleges most frequently mentioned on these forums, remember that there are also commuter and non-traditional students for whom their near-campus residence is their primary and only home, so they are not going anywhere.
Even for many traditional students, moving back to their parents’ place on short notice can be logistically more difficult than doing so as previously scheduled at the end of the academic year, so many of those in near-campus housing may choose to stay there until the end of the academic year.
S19 is at his dorm packing up most stuff right now - I told him to leave things like bedding, trashbaskets, chair for later, but all class material, clothes, soccer gear etc comes home. He is sad, but agrees with decision. However, I can already see we will have trouble limiting exposure at home - he’s not happy that we nixed daily group get-togethers at Starbucks and Panera, no big parties, etc. I’ve seen his high school gang - they can’t not hang all over each other:)
He attends UofSC. Originally, the instructions were to stay home if you could after Spring Break, but dorms and dining would stay open for those who wish. Classes are going online for the foreseeable future. Most kids elected the “stay” option (because…'Rona Parties), at which point the rules changed to “You may stay if you have extenuating circumstances, a request for which must be submitted in writing and approved.” And the Greek houses were ordered shut down.
D19 is headed back to Ohio State today from her Florida spring break. My husband is flying from Boston to Columbus to meet her there and help her move out. Ohio State initially said dorms would stay open but classes would be online, then 3 days ago changed it to pack up and go home. They extended Spring Break one more week so the students could move out. There’s a scheduling process to maintain social distancing during move-out.
We just decided to bring everything home instead of storing it, since we’re not confident that things will be back to normal by fall. D19 is sad to be leaving.
@SammoJ So kids are going to be allowed to go back to the dorms later to get the rest of their stuff? I don’t know how far away you are from school but I bet they are going to change their minds and want everything out. Seems like most colleges had kids pack up. I doubt any college is going back to school this year. When Bowdoin’s president was asked in the town hall why we didn’t just extend spring break and make a decision in a few weeks, he said he’s having everyone move out because the other option is really just giving false hope that the college will resume in person.