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Opinion

Is Campus Safe?

On the top of everyone’s minds is keeping themselves and others safe amid the coronavirus pandemic. As many have come to see, numerous limitations have been placed everywhere in order to allow us to continue along with our daily lives while mitigating the spread.

As fall approached, one questioned how our educational system would handle this. Some schools had reasoned, due to their size and complications, to go fully online for the semester; others, like ours, had developed a program of both hybrid and online classes. Now the question comes, “Do you feel safe coming to campus right now?”

Currently, I am a sophomore Biochemistry major and a commuter; therefore, I have a wide mix of both online and hybrid classes. With my current situation, I only drive up to campus a few days a week, but otherwise, I work from home.

Coming to campus, I do feel mostly safe, and the campus has assembled numerous precautions and services in order to moderate the virus’ impact on the student and faculty populations. Most major halls have temperature check systems; prior to entering an in-person class, depending on the building, they will check your temperature in order to allow entrance.

In addition to that, we have the CampusClear app to self-check one’s symptoms on a daily basis, as well as daily updates on the Monmouth website in regards to the number of cases that are present within the campus community. There is also sanitizer and wipes found in each classroom and laboratory.

Monmouth has also achieved engagement from students to help fight against the virus. For example, they gave out masks with the school’s logo on it, encouraging students to wear their masks on campus grounds. Through being observed personally in the course of the semester thus far, this system of monitoring and information developed by Monmouth has worked quite progressively so far.

However, with the coronavirus, there is always a slight risk when going anywhere that you will interact with a larger, outside body of people. College settings are notorious and the perfect social environments for larger populations that can allow, if not monitored properly, for a virus to spread quickly.

At Monmouth currently, despite the limitations and guidelines in place, cases are starting to rise in number. Of course, these risks were calculated and precautions are in place for said situations. For me personally, as a commuter student especially, I do question whether going to the campus in person is truly safe at times due to this associated risk and having that slight possibility of catching it.

For the most part, I feel that the campus community is a safe place for students to be as long as proper health and safety protocols are followed, such as wearing masks or getting tested when suspected. If we are aware of the slight risks that are possible, then we can still have a great educational experience despite the newly adopted everyday precautions.

 

PHOTO COURTESY of Monmouth University