THURSDAY, JANUARY 27, 2022
Volume 150 No. 4
ESTABLISHED 1826 — OLDEST COLLEGE NEWSPAPER WEST OF THE ALLEGHENIES
“Traditional Movein” with COVID-19 testing required for spring semester COSETTE GUNTER CAMPUS & COMMUNITY EDITOR When Sophia Ogot received an email from Miami University’s Residence Life staff that told her to arrive on campus with COVID-19 test results, she quickly found out there were no available tests in her area in California. Like Ogot, more than 7,800 other on-campus students were expected to provide a negative COVID-19 test result (PCR or antigen), administered no more than three days before returning to campus this spring. Ogot, a sophomore political science major, ended up flying in the Friday before classes started and crashing on the couch of an off-campus friend before getting a test in Oxford to fulfill the requirement. On Sunday, Jan. 23, students checked in for move-in day at a desk in their residence hall, where their testing documentation was reviewed before they moved in. For Ogot, her CVS PCR test results weren’t ready in time for move-in, but she was able to move into her residence hall before being instructed to visit Harris Hall where a rapid COVID-19 test was performed. “It wasn’t really that busy,” Ogot said. “It was really convenient, and it only took 15 minutes.” Ogot said the whole movein process was pretty easy. Steve Large, assistant vice president for health & wellness, said this semester’s move-in went better than expected. “From my perspective, move-in this semester went extraordinarily well,” Large said. “From a COVID-19 perspective, we had anticipated and planned for a variety of possibilities, and really, there were no issues that came up throughout moving that we didn’t already anticipate or plan for.” Large said the staff was prepared to test 300 students on site if they didn’t bring proof of a negative test, but only 81 students needed the service. Of that 81 tested, three came back positive. Large reported that 95% of on-campus students were in compliance with the move-in protocols. The only exception to the arrival testing was students who have tested positive for and recovered from COVID-19 in the last 90 days and provided proof. “We are still identifying right now who the non-actors are,” Large said. “Non-actors is how I would describe a student that either didn’t provide a negative result or didn’t email their result to COVID-19@miamioh, or didn’t complete the 90-day exemption form. So that’s what we’re doing now is sorting through all of that data to identify who, if any, and how many non-actors there were.” Large said the main concerns he heard from parents were around the type of COVID-19 tests that would be accepted and the detailed definition of the three-day test window. Large also noted that this semester’s move-in looked similar to pre-COVID-19 move-in protocols, with the exception of the arrival testing. “This semester, was a, I would say, a ‘traditional movein,’ where all on-campus students were invited to return back to campus for Sunday, unless they had sought and received permission to return early,” Large said, “which we certainly had a number of students that did return early as well.” Large said around 500 students returned early to campus. These students were able to move in without providing test results, but were asked to pick up an at-home test from Armstrong and report the results to the COVID-19 email inbox. Ogot said she preferred the staggered move-in dates from previous semesters to the one day move-in. “It was actually easier my freshman year because they had testing sites already set CONTINUED ON PAGE 2
Miami university — Oxford, Ohio
Class structure to look much like the fall amid COVID-19 surge
In this issue
REAGAN RUDE ASST. CAMPUS & COMMUNITY EDITOR As the semester drew to a close last fall, low case numbers and high vaccination rates made Miami University students hopeful that the spring semester would look more normal. Then came omicron. Now, with cases in Oxford on the rise and McCullough-Hyde Memorial Hospital running out of ICU beds, students and faculty are coming to terms with the prospect of a semester that looks much like the last. “We are not at this moment changing anything from last semester,” Provost Jason Osborne wrote in an email to The Miami Student. “We are adapting where the CDC has changed guidance, and those updates have been communicated through the COVID task force emails.” Osborne said about 91% of undergraduate classes will be taught in person this semester, similar to the number for the fall. George Denman, a visiting faculty member in the marketing department, said he’s glad his marketing class will be held in-person. “I personally feel that being there live in front of these students provides a much better format, one where students could actually bond much easier than online,” Denman said. Despite the recent surge in cases, Denman said he feels comfortable teaching face-to-face. “I’m not really concerned because I’m vaccinated and boosted,” Denman said. “Even if I do get it, I’m in good health at my age, and I think that the symptoms would be minimal at best.” Denman said he would understand if the omicron variant forced classes to move online, but he hopes that won’t happen. While the majority of classes this semester are in-person, some professors are keeping at least a portion of their meetings online. Shanieka Pope, an assistant clinical professor of family science and social work, said the hybrid synchronous format of her FSW312 (Human Behavior in the Social Environment) class had already been determined before it was assigned to her. Although Pope didn’t personally select the hybrid option, she does have some discretion with holding in-person classes.
CAMPUS & COMMUNITY A Miami Student writer recounts her experience missing the first week back to classes in the midst of the omicron wave. - page 4 CAMPUS & COMMUNITY Explore an Oxford hidden gem: Oxford Lanes. - page 7
FOOD Ranking the potatoes of Oxford: Spud or Dud? - page 9
DESIGNER ALESSANDRA MANUKIAN
“Say, for instance, a good amount of my students are out or quarantining, then I do have the discretion to make my class remote,” Pope said. “But that’s only on a week-by-week basis, so I could not shut down in-person class for the entire semester.” Pope said high numbers of absences last semester almost forced her to go remote, but it never came to that. She hopes she can keep her meetings in person this semester as well. “There’s synergy in the room with face-to-face,” Pope said. “Students may bring something to the discussion that resonates with the other students, and you just have that flow of ideas and expressions.” In addition to the benefits for students, Pope said face-to-face instruction is less tiring. “When I’m online, I tend to escalate my expressions,” Pope said. “I start to sweat because I feel like I have to make my gestures and my personality bigger just to connect with the students.”
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ENTERTAINMENT Tom Holland sticks the landing in "Spider-Man: No Way Home." - page 8
SPORTS Men's basketball suffers from inconsistent play going into Saturday's match-up vs. Eastern Michigan. - page 10 OPINION Our columnist took winter break to recenter themselves after a busy semester - page 12
That art is out of this world … literally
SOPHOMORE PRESTON ANDERSON IS ONE OF 76 ARTISTS TO HAVE THEIR ART SENT TO THE MOON. PHOTO BY PRESTON ANDERSON
ABBY BAMMERLIN CAMPUS & COMMUNITY EDITOR When Preston Anderson submitted his painting to an online art show, he didn’t expect for it to be shown in a Chicago contemporary art gallery. When he found out his painting would be one of a few hung in the gallery, he was overjoyed. But the next email put him into a state of disbelief. “I was like, ‘This can’t be real, like this [has] got to be spam or something,” Anderson said. “This is too good to be true.” Anderson’s painting “Tunnel Vision,” selected for the exhibition, is one of 76 other artists whose art would be sent to the moon. The pieces are part of The Nova Collection time capsule. The art will be laser-etched on nickel microfiche, which will be placed in a time cap-
"It's really cool to see my hard work paying off and kind of seeing where it might be able to take me in the future." - Preston Anderson sule on a Nova-C lunar lander for a future launch through SpaceX. “I think it’s so cool that that’s something that creatives can be a part of, let alone myself, like that’s just an incredible opportunity,” Anderson said. In the summer of 2020, in the midst of pandemic-related lockdowns, Miami University now-sophomore Preston Anderson stumbled upon an online art show, held by 33 Contemporary Gallery in Chicago, that was taking submissions.
“I kind of took a shot in the dark and decided to apply to one of the shows called ‘Shelter,’” Anderson said. “I just decided, what the heck, may as well just see what can happen here.” Anderson said the show’s theme was centered around questions like “Where can we go?” and “How can we connect with finding peace within ourselves and within the world?” While looking back through his work, “Tunnel Vision,” a piece he created in high school, stood out to him.
The painting features a child walking through a forest with a red wagon, head down. In front of him stands a dark tunnel. “It kind of resembles if we’re not willing to look up and really take in the beauty around us, we’ll only see what we want to see,” Anderson said. When he found out “Tunnel Vision” had been accepted for the show, he was shocked. “It was like disbelief,” Anderson said. “I remember I was at a friend’s house and I was like, ‘Is this really true? Like, can you look this up? Can you see if this is actually happening?’” Grant Gilsdorf, Anderson’s high school art teacher, was the one who told Anderson about the exhibit. The two artists had kept in touch even after Anderson graduated. When Gilsdorf saw the exhibit was taking submissions, he knew Anderson would be perfect for the show. “[Anderson] was creating gallery-level artwork in high school,” Gilsdorf said, “and the only thing that would have prevented him from being on that level would have just been an ignorance of the opportunity.” Gilsdorf met Anderson his sophomore year of high school and has continued to mentor him into college. He said Anderson’s work ethic made him stand out. “What endears me to him is what I think endears a lot of teachers to their students, just that he outworks everybody else,” Gilsdorf said. “He’s certainly talented, and talent is great. But what makes Preston truly special is just, he’s tougher than everybody else.” As a business major, Anderson said pursuing art in the future may be complicated, but he’s determined to end up in a career field that will allow him to still do art in some way. “It’s really cool to see my hard work paying off and kind of seeing where it might be able to take me in the future,” Anderson said. When Anderson created his piece “Tunnel Vision,” the pandemic hadn’t started yet. But now thinking back on what his art could bring to viewers, Anderson said he can see a connection to the current pandemic. “I think in COVID … it might have been hard for a lot of people to find the better side of things, I suppose,” Anderson said. “So I thought this piece might be able to resonate with some people and kind of emulate that idea of shelter.” @abby_bammerlin bammeraj@miamioh.edu