Some American Colleges Return to COVID-19 Restrictions
2022-04-26
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1Many university students in the United States thought they would get through the final weeks of the 2021-2022 school year without another COVID-19 restriction.
2That is no longer the case for some.
3Major universities in the states of New York, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Connecticut and Texas recently put pandemic restrictions back in place. Many are once again requiring face coverings.
4In Washington, D.C., Howard University moved its classes back online.
5At Rice University in Texas, leaders told students to cancel any large parties.
6These and other rules come about three weeks before many universities hoped to hold graduation events without restrictions.
7For some students, it is the third straight year of COVID-related restrictions.
8Nina Heller is a third-year student at American University in Washington, D.C.
9When the school year started last August, she said many people thought "we're nearing the tail end" of the pandemic.
10"That didn't quite happen," Heller said.
11Most universities removed mask-wearing requirements earlier in 2022, after the fast spread of the Omicron variant ended.
12But a new version of Omicron is now spreading, especially in the northeastern part of the U.S.
13The new variant is known as BA.2.
14For a short time in April, the city of Philadelphia brought back mask requirements.
15Universities there, including Temple and the University of Pennsylvania, followed along.
16While Philadelphia removed the mask requirement, the universities kept it in place on campus.
17At Williams College in Massachusetts, some professors permitted students to come to class without masks beginning in April.
18But after less than a week, the university put a new requirement in place.
19Kitt Urdang is a third-year student at Williams.
20Urdang said many friends are getting sick. Urdang said they were "dropping like flies."
21"There's definitely been a lot more uncertainty" in recent days, the student added.
22In Washington, D.C., Howard's campus was quiet last week.
23Students studied for their final exams and took classes from home.
24The number of COVID-19 cases in D.C. increased by 100 percent in April.
25The university has not said if it will change plans for graduation, set to take place May 7.
26Lia DeGroot is a student at George Washington University, also in D.C.
27She said she never stopped wearing her mask and that returning to face coverings is "a relatively small thing to do."
28Other universities, such as Johns Hopkins in Baltimore, are asking students to take COVID-19 virus tests two times a week.
29At New Mexico State University, students are now required to have a COVID-19 vaccine by July 1 instead of showing a negative virus test each week.
30Anita Barking is a leader of the COVID-19 task force for the American College Health Association.
31She said "the pandemic is still with us."
32She said that even if students would like it to be over, that is just "wishful thinking."
33But many students are thinking that way.
34Neeraj Sudhakar is working on an advanced degree in engineering at Columbia University in New York City.
35Sudhakar said most students there are vaccinated.
36The student said: "I think we just need to move on with the pandemic and treat it as endemic rather than going back to what we were doing the past two years."
37I'm Dan Friedell.