The University of Kentucky In The Time Of Covid

 

        As mentioned earlier, I am a sophomore at the University of Kentucky. As soon as students arrived on campus, UK required that all students must be tested for COVID-19. If any student tested positive, they went either sent home or quarantined in a specific dorm. Classes resumed on the 17th of August, but they look a little different this semester. Based on the course, a student could have their classes online, in-person, or hybrid. A "hybrid" class just means that half of the meetings will be in a standard classroom, while the other half will meet online. The university decided to offer classes this way to make social distancing possible in some of the larger classes. The classes that are meeting in-person require the students to wear a mask the whole time and practice social distancing baby spacing out the students six feet apart. Also, the dinning halls on campus have reduced seating to prohibit groups of people from gathering. These few examples show that the university is doing everything they can to combat the current pandemic and keep the campus as open as possible. However, the number of positive cases have been on the rise on campus.

    Since coming to campus, students in greek life have tested three times as high as the rest of the student body living on campus. Because of these high numbers, UK has decided to retest all students in greek life. Many students involved in greek life live in their specific houses with hundreds of others students. These close communal spaces make it hard for the students to physically distance themselves more than students living in a dorm. Personally, the majority of people that I know who have tested positive have been involved in greek life, so I think what the university is making the right move by retesting these students. However, I also think that retesting all of the students within the next month would be smart just to be sure that numbers have not risen. 

    I believe that the steps that the University of Kentucky have taken so far are completely necessary and will allow the campus to stay open for the remainder of the semester. From walking around on campus, I can tell that the majority of students are wearing masks and trying to socially distance as much as possible.  So even though the numbers of positive cases may be growing, I think that classes will continue to be available in-person due to the protective measures that have been put in place.