Orange
As you can see at Our Way Forward (and in the email sent to parents and families), we have raised our operating status to Orange, which means Modified Campus Operations. Lots to unpack here.
The goal of moving to Orange Status is to pause activities that are most likely to allow further spread of COVID-19. This will permit us to evaluate the prevalence of the virus and slow the pace of its spread while we determine if further steps will be required to contain it.
Our dashboard shows that there has been a jump in cases. And a note on the dashboard: we have rearranged the top section. The first cell you see has the total cases we’ve had since 8/17, and the far right shows the cases in the last 14 days (do not panic thinking that the left cell is our recent cases!). Also, we are aware that the dashboard is experiencing high traffic; we appreciate your patience. Our increase in cases mirrors the resurgence of the virus in North Carolina and across the country. Our health advisors say we should expect to see 3-5 days of more increases in positive cases before we see our numbers settle or decline.
We have seen this situation play out at other institutions, so it is important we get in front of this now before it gets out of control. There are a number of steps we are taking that will hopefully prevent the continued spread of COVID and allow us to continue to stay on campus through Thanksgiving.
First things first – how can we understand our current situation?
- There are a moderate number of known, positive cases on campus. Most have been identified via SneezSafe and the Student Health Service.
- While no one likes to see a rise in cases, it does show that our testing and contact tracing are working as intended: we are finding those cases we have. This is a good thing, because quickly identifying positive cases and getting known contacts into quarantine will help us mitigate the spread.
- So how did we get here? Our experts believe that rise in case is caused by casual interactions with friends, social gatherings associated with some student organizations, and by going out to bars and restaurants. Those are all things we can control by adjusting our behavior.
So what do our students need to do?
We need to work on two fronts: 1) making sure we aren’t letting our guard down with known COVID risks, and 2) taking some precautionary measures for the next 10 days to help reduce the spread of the virus within our community.
On the ‘don’t let your guard down’ front, the two biggest factors seem to be eating and socializing with friends. As the email to campus explains, we will
- Limit food to grab-and-go options and no indoor seating
- Reduce the number of people at outdoor dining to two per table
- Be vigilant about gathering size (10 people max indoors; 25 max outdoors). Social distancing requirements, especially in residence halls, will limit that number further due to space constraints, as we shared with students previously.
- Strictly follow all the standard public health guidelines (wear a mask, except when you are actively eating; keep six feet of distance between yourself and other people; wash your hands often; avoid large in-person social gatherings).
On the ‘preventive measures’ front, we will take the following steps for the next 10 days to see if that makes a difference in our rates:
- Regretfully, we will suspend some planned events or modify to make them virtual
- Increase asymptomatic testing of students
- We ask that students who reside on-campus travel off-campus only for essentials, like grocery shopping. We also ask that students avoid discretionary or personal entertainment, particularly frequenting crowded bars and restaurants.
- We still want and need students to vote, but will be suspending the daily walk to the polls as a group. (It’s an easy walk and your Deacs can go on their own.)
- Admissions visits (which had already been very restricted) will be suspended starting Monday.
After 10 days, we will re-evaluate how the virus is affecting our community. Should the virus rate escalate rapidly, we will take more immediate action. The evaluation could also result in needing to move our community to Red Status — Reduced Contact Campus Operations.
You can help us, Daily Deacdom, in the following ways:
- Ask your students if they are strictly adhering to masking, social distancing, handwashing, and avoiding gatherings. Those are keys to good public health.
- Discourage your students from going to crowded restaurants or bars.
- Honor the Restricted Family Visitation Policy. Due to the desire to minimize the risk of transmission of COVID, only students, faculty, and staff have access to campus. Wake Forest strongly encourages all students and their families to limit family visitations that may occur off-campus this semester. With cases on the rise nationwide, we want to do all we can to limit the potential of introducing COVID on campus via visits. (And please know this is not the normal warm, Southern hospitality we would offer Wake families. You know we love you all! This is strictly because we are trying to mitigate the impact of COVID on our campus).
While Wake is sending these messages to your students, having you amplify these key points will help stress their importance. You are our best partners in this work.
You can continue to stay in touch with all COVID related news on Our Way Forward, and I will keep bringing you as much color and context as I can via the Daily Deac.
For the next 10 days, we’ll take it one day at a time. Going forward, we’ll all have to make one good decision after another, every day, day after day. Working together, we will get there.
NOTE: The Call Center will be open today and Friday from 10 am- 3 pm Eastern, and Saturday and Sunday from 10 am-2 pm Eastern at 336-758-7500. We kindly ask that parents and families direct questions to the Call Center, and refrain from contacting administrative offices such as the Student Health Service or the quarantine hotel. The Student Health Service cannot answer questions about testing policy or processes, as medical staff must be free to address students’ health issues, and the hotel staff needs to be free to assist students as they arrive. You can also submit questions or feedback online.