A good friend of mine & I were chatting about the 2008 downturn.
Her H was in finance, lost his job, and was out of work for…13? 15? months? It was a long time.
Over-qualified. Out of work too long. Etc.
She thinks her kids will never be the same — the financial & emotional toll it took on their family was significant.
We went thru something similar. H was working. but had to accept a job with a substantial reduction in pay and kid-unfriendly hours. I tried to pick up any extra hours I could at work and this resulted in the kids being left alone for too many hours at too young an age —definitely not our first choice.
Kids don’t always share, even with close friends, the financial & emotional strains going on in their home.
People are going to lose their businesses and livelihoods. Many families are going to be put thru the wringer.
Unemployment Insurance & other aid is unlikely to last until there is a vaccine.
Frankly, I’m relieved one kid is 100% off the payroll and the other kid is 95% off.
I would not relish going thru with them, something way worse than 2008, and facing college.
The Stanford campus certainly has a lot of space to set up big tents to make outdoor classrooms. It may not work as well during the winter quarter, but even if enclosed to keep out wind and rain, they could provide more classroom space to allow classes to be held in larger classrooms than they would normally be held in.
“Perspective about “it could be worse” is good but also it’s okay for kids (and parents) to be sad and disappointed over what they’re missing out on.”
Yeah, we’ve got that covered. Angry/sad/disappointed all the time - especially when being asked to do any kind of ‘work’. But in an annoyed teenager kind of way, not a worrying way. Happily laughing and talking with friends during evening facetime sessions. Not sure how long to indulge this behavior - its grating on everyone.
My oldest is at UC Davis which has a lot of outdoor space and a lot of tents that they use for events (both in the rain and in the heat). This is promising.
This coming Tuesday MIT will hold a virtual townhall to discuss the range of options they are considering.
According to yesterday’s issue of MIT student newspaper these options range from holding the Fall semester online to several on-campus/off campus schemes to delaying the Fall semester six weeks. It isn’t clear if a normal semester is still an option being considered.
@TheVulcan Yeah I get your point of view. Simple is better. But I think maybe current students likely feel differently than incoming students and want/need to get back. Any more creative options are of course more risky and welcome the possibility that they will see an uptick in the virus. It’s just going to be hard to choose anything other than online because it’s like trying to predict the future. I’m starting to think that the second less risky option is to push off any return a little longer. Then, if we get to late August and going back to campus in October is still dicey, schools will have to bite the bullet and do online from home.
Of course, MIT being so urban is part of the problem for them.
And now I’m concerned about states wanting OOS students to quarantine for 14 days before going out in public. No college would be able to pull that off.
I asked our ER docs when the best time to open college would be. They all said July, if possible. Warm weather, kids outside a good part of the day, a more gradual exposure to the virus around them at a time when seasonal flu isn’t around. It won’t happen, but I thought their perspective was interesting
Rice just sent a letter to the kids (I haven’t seen it yet) saying that while Texas was opening things up right now, the staff and students still on campus were still being asked to work remotely. They are working on a plan to phase people back on campus (I assume starting with staff) and are lifting travel restrictions. However, anyone traveling back to campus from out of the country or a list of like 12 states/large cities are being asked to self-quarantine for 2 weeks. I assume they mean for now and not the fall.
Thank you for sharing this. My son is majoring music performance at a small private conservatory (about total 600 BM+MM students: classical, orchestral, vocal, jazz, theater, dance and music technology) and about 200-250 undergrad students living in campus in urban area. All students are required in-person ensemble trainings / performances to graduate. All ensembles are mixed classes (BM/MM) by auditions. His school already changed the policy of leave-of-absence / gap year request for next fall / academic year due to Coronavirus impact. If his school really needs to reduce numbers of student on campus at once for social distancing requirements (not only reducing dorm density), I think that one of MIT options would work better than full fall semester online classes. Students in certain programs / ensembles get in-person classes at campus in first half of semester, then other programs / ensembles in second half of semester.
—The fall semester will be split into two sessions. Each student will attend one session on campus and the other session virtually. Of the 4,530 undergraduates enrolled at MIT, about 2,200 will be on campus at one time—-
Then, I am wondering…Is spring semester going to ok? Can we assume spring semester (January to May) has no serious virus hit?
Teaching remotely is much more difficult and time consuming than teaching in person. Very few people WANT to do it. Some people may HAVE TO do it for their own health and safety or for that of their family members.
Regardless of the reason for it, online teaching services are less valued than in person services. One generally pays less for things less valued. Many people are in jobs they do not want to do, but presumably have to do in order to eat.
Obviously, it is a lose-lose for both parties, where the seller is burdened with increased costs to provide what the buyer values less.
Colleges are not the only situations where this is the case.
Yes, they can go back to normal, but it would still be a lose-lose for both parties, since the risk of being infected is a cost that both parties are trying to avoid.
I don’t think that the unions would allow a teacher who is in the vulnerable category to have to take a wage cut for taking steps to protect themselves like teaching online.
Splitting a semester in two would be hard to execute in practice. A half-semester would be just over 7 weeks long, and at least one of weeks (if not more) would be taken up by midterms and finals and at least another day or two for packing and travelling between the two sessions. What courses would be offered during the first (or second) half-semester? What if the courses a student wants to take are mostly in the first (or second) half-semester? How does a student balance her/his course load between the two half-semesters if s/he is taking an odd number of classes?
Yes. But come the next wave, and if it’s significant, universities will send kids home again. Because they would have already gotten the tuition money. And they cannot afford the inevitable negligence lawsuits if kids get sick. Because, trust me, in such an event, those lawsuits will come.