THE INDEPENDENT
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NOTRE DAME, SAINT MARY’S
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IT ACCURATELY
VOLUME 55, ISSUE 5 | FRIDAY, AUGUST 21, 2020 | NDSMCOBSERVER.COM
The Observer strives to do what’s best for the community. To do so, we are halting physical production while Notre Dame participates in remote learning. We’ll still be producing daily content online and will resume printing as soon as the situation allows.
Don’t make us write obituaries. When we learned the institutions within the tri-campus community intended to have students return for the fall semester, we experienced a variety of emotions — excitement to reunite with our friends, relief to return to the classroom following the difficulties of remote instruction and reluctance to acknowledge that the in-person semester we were promised could be taken away at a moment’s notice. Two weeks into the semester, our worries are close to reality. The University administration has largely blamed the COVID-19 outbreak on students attending off-campus parties. While this isn’t entirely misplaced, it has been used to deflect responsibility from the very administrations that insisted they were prepared for us to return to campus. Clearly, they were not. Flaws in testing, contact tracing and isolation and quarantine accommodations have since proven inefficient. At Notre Dame, the almost two-week gap between the return to campus and the implementation of surveillance testing, scheduled to begin today, represents a gross
oversight on the part of the administration and has put the health and safety of the tri-campus and South Bend communities in serious danger. Experts warned this was likely, but University President Fr. John Jenkins insisted it was worth the risk. Presidents Katie Conboy and Fr. David Tyson seemed to agree. Since our return, a dashboard has provided the Notre Dame community with updates regarding the coronavirus on campus, but it leaves much to be desired in comparison to other institutions’ initiatives, such as that of the University of North Carolina. As the events on campus have drawn national scrutiny, information regarding hospitalizations, recoveries and available quarantine and isolation space should be made public as well as a breakdown in the demographics of students testing positive. The community’s understanding of the seriousness of the situation depends on it. Saint Mary’s and Holy Cross have provided even less information than Notre Dame. While we would like to know more about cases and testing
on campus, we also call upon both Colleges to provide the same information we are asking the University to release. The lack of transparency from our administrations only compounds the worry and anxiety felt by students, faculty and staff alike. If we’ve learned anything in the past months, it’s to take nothing for granted. The expectation that everyday life will continue as it always has can no longer exist. As redundant as it sounds, the next two weeks will shape the trajectory for the rest of the semester and perhaps the ones to follow. The blame for this does not lie with just one party. We — as students, faculty, staff and administrators — need to share responsibility for the outbreak on our hands. We longed to return to South Bend while in quarantine last semester. Now, we are at risk of hurting the community we’ve come to know and love. We implore members of the tri-campus community to do everything within their power to approach this virus in an appropriate and serious manner. Otherwise, we fear the worst is yet to come.
Don’t make us write a tri-campus employee’s obituary. Don’t make us write an administrator’s obituary. Don’t make us write a custodian’s obituary. Don’t make us write a dining hall worker’s obituary. Don’t make us write a professor’s obituary. Don’t make us write a classmate’s obituary. Don’t make us write a friend’s obituary. Don’t make us write a roommate’s obituary. Don’t make us write yours.
2
NEWS
THE OBSERVER | FRIDAY, AUGUST 21, 2020 | NDSMCOBSERVER.COM
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Students call for transparency By LAYTON HALL News Writer
The second student senate meeting of the school year convened via Zoom on Thursday to discuss the current state of Notre Dame affairs. The session began with a call to action from senior student body president Rachel Ingal. “We really just need to be intentional with all of our actions and be very accountable and understanding,” Ingal said. “Keep kindly having those educational conversations with our friends. I would urge you to not resort to shameful tactics but just be informative, talking about the science.” Co-directors of the First Undergraduate Experience in Leadership (FUEL), seniors Kevin Gallagher and Fritz Schemel then updated the senate on the First Year Leadership Showcase, an event that will be held virtually Sunday at 7 p.m. The showcase is meant to encourage budding leaders of the freshman class to apply for positions within student government. Student body vice president and senior Sarah Galbenski then took the floor and led newly elected first year Daniel Schermerhorn in his oath of office. Schermerhorn is filling the vacant senate seat of Baumer Hall that was last held by senior Thomas McCoy. Next, seniors Michael Dugan, Dillion Hall senator, and Ricardo Pozas Garza, Club Coordination Council president, introduced Resolution SS202113 to the floor. The resolution called
Holy Cross reports 2 COVID cases Observer Staff Report
Two Holy Cross students have tested positive for COV ID-19, College President Fr. David Tyson said in an email to the Holy Cross community Thursday. The students who tested positive have been placed in isolation, and individuals who were in close contact with the students are now in quarantine. “Team members will make daily calls with the students in isolation as well as those in quarantine, ensuring all needs are met such as meals and prescriptions,” Tyson said. Tyson urged students to continue to abide by safety precautions. “We ask that you continue the daily health check, along with being mindful about physical distancing, wearing masks and practicing good hygiene to keep our campus healthy and safe,” Tyson said. “We will continue to use strict cleaning protocols to keep all areas of the campus sanitized.”
on the University to regularly publish COVID-19 modeling. The text of the document recognizes that University President Fr. John Jenkins has explicitly mentioned the University’s risk analysis in his July 29 message to campus and states that students have a right to know what the quantified risk of being on campus is. (Editor’s Note: Dugan is a former news writer and systems administrator at The Observer.) “There’re two, one of which is transparency, one of which is substantially that I think we all deserve to know the risks associated with whatever the University’s plan is,” Dugan said. “If the University is saying internally, [that they] believe that this course of action will result in x hospitalizations [and] y student cases, I think students have a right to know that.” Following the resolution’s proposal, sophomore Keough Hall senator Benjamin Erhardt put forth an amendment that calls on the University to provide additional statistics to the COVID-19 HERE Dashboard. Several senators supported this amendment and advocated for specific statistics they believed should be published. The final list of proposed statistics to be included on the dashboard included: active and recovered case counts, current number of students quarantined or isolated, number of occupied quarantine and isolation units, dorm-by-dorm case distributions and surveillance testing statistics. Erhardt said the amendment was meant to support the purpose of the
original resolution by calling for more transparency from the University regarding where it stands right now in addition to where the University thinks it will go from here. Dugan, with the support of his cosponsor Garza, agreed to add this amendment to the final text of the resolution. Through the debate, several comparisons were made to the public information provided by both the University of North Carolina (UNC) at Chapel Hill and Cornell University. UNC has regularly published many statistics on their dashboard including percentage capacity of quarantine and isolation units, inventory of protective equipment and testing positivity rates. Cornell University published an extensive report of its model’s predictions for infection and hospitalization percentages during the fall semester. Many senators made clear that they have heard of a swell of dissatisfaction with regards to the transparency of the University and hope this resolution will compel Notre Dame to address those concerns. In what was a brief questioning and debate period, the resolution passed with a large majority. Thus the student senate has formally called upon the University to regularly publish internal predictive modeling for the spread of COVID-19 as well as add additional statistics to the HERE dashboard. This is a non-binding resolution and will only be presented as the recommendation of the student body. Contact Layton Hall at lhall8@nd.edu
Saint Mary’s limits visitors, gatherings Observer Staff Report
In an email to students Thursday afternoon, interim vice president for student affairs Gloria Roldán Jenkins announced the immediate change to the visitor policy which will last at least two weeks. In addition, visitors may not visit public areas on campus grounds. “As we seek to limit exposure to the virus for students on our campus, effective immediately and for at least the next two weeks, students at Saint Mary’s may not have visitors on campus grounds,” Jenkins said. “This includes visitors from our tri-campus community, and the general external population. It also affects visits in public areas on campus grounds, including those in cars, on the nature trail, and walks on our pathways.” Though students in residence halls can continue to visit each other using the proper safety protocols, off-campus students can no longer visit students living in dorms. “We are joining our neighbors in their endeavor to maintain a safe and healthy community by supporting their decision to not allow Saint Mary’s students to visit Notre Dame and Holy Cross College campuses for the next two weeks,” Jenkins said. “Saint Mary’s students enrolled in classes at Notre Dame and Holy Cross will participate
in their classes virtually. Notre Dame and Holy Cross students who have classes at Saint Mary’s can also participate in their classes virtually.” Jenkins encouraged students to report anyone who makes them feel uncomfortable with their noncompliance to the policy via a Student Concern Form. She also warned that anyone in serious violation of new standards will face disciplinary measures, including the potential removal from the College. “Belles, while Saint Mary’s is part of a tri-campus community, we are a fully independent campus,” Jenkins said. “Our choices are our own. Because of this, we have an opportunity to take action — and limit the virus on our campus. Please do your part and hold others accountable for doing theirs.” In a second email Thursday evening, Jenkins announced that for at least the next two weeks, informal social gatherings will be limited to 15 people. “This does not include classroom instruction, Mass, student organization approved events and meetings or other formal student events,” Jenkins said. Jenkins went on to ask students to dramatically decrease their time off campus and only attend essential events. Jenkins referred students to the College’s Live, Learn, Work page for daily updates on positive cases.
THE OBSERVER | FRIDAY, AUGUST 21, 2020 | NDSMCOBSERVER.COM
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LETTER TO THE EDITOR
No longer Here I have been a University defender until now. Returning to campus, I believed, would be safe. Although there would be cases, these students would be isolated and, with the contract-tracing methods in place, those who had been exposed to the disease would also be quarantined. When I returned to campus, I held onto this hope. While sitting in class, socially distant from my peers and professors, I felt that the University had done everything it could to make campus a safe and healthy place. I was wrong. The events of the past couple days have revealed just how inadequately prepared Notre Dame is to handle this pandemic. In the address to the student body last night, Fr. Jenkins said that the administration had been considering sending us all home, suggesting that the University was not and is not prepared to handle an outbreak of this magnitude. In the past 24 hours, students have received a dozen emails pleading with us not to go to parties and bars, because that is where the disease spreads most easily. The Wall Street Journal, which broke the news before the University’s official statement, said that new cases have been linked to off-campus parties, and the University has now banned all off-campus students from campus for the next two weeks. I hear that. I too, am angry and upset that we as students have not followed these rules and guidelines. However, the finger pointing, particularly towards off-campus students, needs to end. As of yesterday, the
University’s new policy allows student centers and lounges around campus to remain open during reduced hours, but they are only available to on-campus students. Off-campus students cannot even stretch their legs with a (masked) stroll around the lakes. All University resources, including something as small as printers, are off-limits if you do not have a bed assigned to you on campus. It is clear that this is a rhetorical device the University is using to escape culpability. Instead of owning up to the extreme lack of testing and sever under-preparation for the worst-case scenario, Notre Dame has placed the blame on its off-campus students for the exponential case growth. Meanwhile, videos of a large party in the middle of South Quad have been circulating on social media, and witnesses have reported a severe lack of mask-wearing and social distancing among those in attendance. It also seems unbelievable to me that no on-campus students ventured off campus to party and visit friends. The University has drawn a severe line between its students in dorms and those in houses and apartments, and this division is not helpful. Notre Dame has abandoned its off-campus students, protecting the fantasy of its perfect campus community from the big, bad off-campus partiers. Although the University prides itself on its community, I would like to remind the University that community, like our responsibilities, does not end as soon as we step off of campus. Building a wall is as divisive as it is ineffective. The reality is that without surveillance testing, we do not
know the scale of the outbreak that we are facing in only the second week on campus. In all the models the University considered when it decided to open its doors, how is it that they did not plan for this worst-case scenario? As anyone with any background in biology will tell you, exponential growth is typical for any disease. There should have been concrete protocols put in place to be enacted should this occasion have arisen. As it is, the University is left unprepared, floundering and looking foolish in the eyes of its community and the world. And worse, it is putting the lives of students faculty, and staff in danger. Yes, students have been asked not to party. Yes, it would have been better for us all if these parties had not occurred. And yes, we all have a personal responsibility for preventing the spread of this disease. I do not condemn the University’s decision to shut down for two weeks; given the number of cases and the rate of growth, I probably would have made the same decision. But for God’s sake, demonizing and abandoning your off-campus students (who are still expected to attend class) without any University resources or guidance only betrays your woeful lack of preparation, and your refusal to take responsibility for this crisis. We are angry. We are scared. According to the University, we are no longer Here. Rachel Hughes senior Aug. 19
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