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Briggs: Purdue can’t beat COVID-19 with student sacrifice


Muda69

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https://www.indystar.com/story/opinion/columnists/james-briggs/2020/08/20/notre-dame-outbreak-shows-why-purdue-cant-beat-coronavirus-discipline/5610546002/

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A peculiar tenet of pandemic-era leadership is the stated belief that some segments of the population are uniquely disciplined to defeat the novel coronavirus with their own good character and willpower.

Gov. Eric Holcomb as recently as last month said it was not necessary to mandate face masks in Indiana, because, “I believe in Hoosiers and I believe that Hoosiers are doing the right thing.” He later issued an executive order requiring people to wear masks.

Purdue University President Mitch Daniels recently sliced off an especially vigilant portion of the Indiana population — students who choose to enroll in classes at Purdue — to explain why he thinks his campus can successfully reopen even as COVID-19 spreads.

“Skeptics are everywhere,” Daniels wrote last week in a letter to Purdue students. “There are those who scoff that it simply cannot be done. Most of those asserting that point directly at students, declaring them — you — unwilling or incapable of the sacrifice necessary to protect others. I don’t believe that, at least not about Boilermakers.”

Whatever special dedication Purdue students might bring to the cause, it has been a decisively bad week for non-Boilermakers.

The University of Notre Dame (which, it should be noted, imports many students from morally inferior Illinois) moved classes online for at least two weeks amid ballooning coronavirus infections. Michigan State University skipped the short-term maneuver and switched its entire fall semester to online-only classes. Ditto for the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, which got the virtual college dominoes rolling this week after identifying at least four clusters of outbreaks in student housing.

The outbreaks within those schools bode ill for reliance on student behavior. Notre Dame, for example, has blamed much of its problem on a single off-campus party.

But Daniels misstates what the skeptics (like me) are worried about. College students aren’t the problem so much as the unreasonable expectations being placed upon them and the misleading messaging that might keep them ignorant of the risks they are walking into.

Daniels has set Purdue on an admirable course, becoming one of the first colleges in the nation to announce that it would welcome students back in the fall and using every moment since then to figure out how to do it. If you’re going to open your campus, that’s the way to do it — with intent and preparation.

Unlike some colleges whose reopening plans seem predicated on the magical thinking of an invisible COVID-19 shield, Purdue’s plan takes into account the expectation that students will be infected. One measure, for instance, is a 600-bed isolation space for students who test positive. That sounds grim, yet shows Purdue isn’t fooling itself about what could happen.

Yet, Daniels’ public message has seemed detached from Purdue’s comprehensive protocols, which factor in the possibility of sick students. Daniels has clung to statements he made in the spring that the coronavirus poses “near-zero lethal risk” to students. That word —“near” — is doing more work than a Purdue offensive lineman in fall camp.

If you accept that the potential deaths of a few students across America (they would represent the “near” part) are worth the societal benefits of in-person college education, then that’s still only one consideration. The effects of COVID-19 go beyond the binary outcomes of living and dying.

The ill-conceived effort to launch a college football season this year has exposed the risk of a heart condition called myocarditis in students. Dr. Mohan Shenoy, a cardiologist with IU Health Southern Indiana Physicians, described myocarditis to the Bloomington Herald-Times as a “very severe infection of the cardiac muscle that goes on for a prolonged period of time.”

That is a heck of a side effect to wind up with. There might be other long-term risks that we don’t know about yet, considering how little is understood about a virus that has been with us for less than a year.

While all of Purdue’s 15,444 incoming students are required to be tested for the coronavirus, it’s unclear how many of them have fully considered the health risks beyond the minuscule chance of death for people in that age range. That potential lack of understanding, combined with the youthful privilege of faux invincibility, reveal the limits of personal responsibility.

One thing auto insurers can tell you is that young people underestimate risk. That’s why teenagers and twentysomethings (or their parents) spend a lot of money on insurance. If insurance executives understand how young adults behave in aggregate — and bake that information into their business model — then you can bet university officials know it, too.

That’s why it is disingenuous for Daniels to suggest that anyone who’s worried about Purdue’s reopening must be rendering judgment on his students’ character. The concern is not about Purdue’s students, but rather that Purdue’s open campus will be perceived as a wink and a nod that it is safe to resume the social activities that have been on hold for so long.

A campus is among the few competitive advantages that big universities can boast. Colleges know that and are anxious to get back to business. They also know reopening a campus guarantees that students will hold parties and meet up in any bar that will have them. Even Boilermakers.

Colleges would do well to drop the pretense that their No. 1 priority is the health and safety of customers (in this case, students). College is a business. The top priority for businesses is to operate to the fullest extent possible. That’s understandable.

Purdue has a plan to open its campus that seems better than most. Despite all that preparation, and despite all those tens of millions of dollars spent, Purdue’s reopening could still go badly.

If it does, this skeptic won’t blame the students.

Ramp up the fear, Mr. Briggs.  It seems to be what you do best.

 

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Sounds like some students didn't want to "sacrifice" :  https://www.jconline.com/story/news/2020/08/20/purdue-suspends-students-first-night-after-mitch-daniels-new-rule-off-campus-parties/5617496002/

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Less than 24 hours after Purdue President Mitch Daniels made it a university violation to host or even go to a party that didn’t follow Protect Purdue Pledge guidelines for social distancing and masks, the university suspended a cooperative house and 36 students for attending a Wednesday night party.

Purdue announced Thursday that the Circle Pines Cooperative, 1000 David Ross Road, and students attending a party there received a “summary suspension for violating the Protect Purdue Pledge.”

“Purdue University has been clear and consistent with our messaging to students about the Protect Purdue Plan and the expectations they would need to follow if they made the decision to be on campus this fall,” Katie Sermersheim, Purdue’s dean of students, said in a statement released by the university.

“Unfortunately, everything we have done – the months of planning to give our students the opportunity to continue their educational pursuits in person – can be undone in the blink of an eye – with just one party or event that does not follow the rules and guidelines,” she said.

....

Attempts to reach someone from Circle Pines Cooperative were not immediately successful.

Purdue Police Department logs showed that officers were investigating an alcohol violation shortly after 11 p.m. Wednesday at 1000 David Ross Road, the address of Circle Pines Cooperative, a housing unit for men. The log did not offer more details than that.

According to Purdue, the students and Circle Pines Cooperative will have a chance to appeal the suspension, with an ultimate sanctioning decision coming after a full hearing process. 

....

 

Edited by Muda69
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  • 3 weeks later...
  • 3 weeks later...

Purdue suspends 14 students, including 13 athletes, for party that violated Pledge

https://www.jconline.com/story/news/2020/09/28/purdue-suspends-14-students-including-13-athletes-party-violated-pledge/3565967001/

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Purdue gave 14 students, including 13 student-athletes, until Wednesday to clear out of their residence hall rooms after being suspended, accused of having a party that violated the university’s coronavirus-era Protect Purdue Pledge, the dean of students announced Monday.

Dean of Students Katie Sermersheim did not name the students, where they lived or which sports the student-athletes play. Purdue athletics issued a statement saying the 13 are "out-of-season student-athletes." The university also did not say whether the students were among the 801 who had tested positive for COVID-19 on campus since Aug. 1. 

In a release issued by Purdue, Sermersheim said University Residences staff found the group having a party in a campus dorm on Saturday. She said they were summarily suspended from the university. She said the students would have a chance to appeal.

The suspensions were the second round reported on the West Lafayette campus – and the first since before classes started Aug. 24 – after Purdue President Mitch Daniels installed the Protect Purdue Pledge into the university’s student code.

....

The Purdue athletic department issued this statement Monday afternoon:

“Purdue Athletics is aware of the incident that took place over the weekend involving 13 out-of-season student-athletes. Our student-athletes, coaches and staff remain committed to following the guidelines of the Protect Purdue Pledge, and have been working with the university throughout this process. While this is an unfortunate occurrence, we hope it’s instructive for all Boilermaker students and reinforces the importance of protecting everyone on campus during this time.”   

  

Asked by the Journal & Courier to clarify out of season, Kassidie Blackstock, Purdue associate athletic director for strategic communications, said the student-athletes participate in winter/spring sports. 

Winter and spring sports at Purdue are men's and women's basketball, baseball, men's and women's golf, softball, men's and women's swimming and diving, men's and women's tennis, track and field and wrestling. 

....

 

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