The University at Buffalo will continue with in-person classes through next Tuesday, even though the university projects by the end of this week to have 100 Covid-19 cases within a two-week period, a threshold the State University of New York has been using for campuses to switch to remote-only instruction.
UB has had 93 Covid-19 positive cases since Nov. 7, putting it on pace for more than 100 cases by Friday, which is the end of the current two-week measuring period SUNY uses to determine if campuses must pause in-person instruction and flip to online-only classes to limit spread of the virus.
But SUNY also has required that campuses test all students for coronavirus prior to Thanksgiving break, to prevent students from spreading Covid-19 when they return home.
UB President Satish K. Tripathi said in an email to students and staff that the remaining days of in-person classes would allow the university more time to complete testing before thousands of students depart for the break.
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UB and most other campuses across the state that were providing in-person instruction decided in August that they would flip to remote-only courses after the Thanksgiving break through the end of the fall semester in December.
“In consultation with our local health department, SUNY, NYS Department of Health and pursuant to current guidance, we intend to maintain in-person instruction as scheduled,” Tripathi said in an email Tuesday afternoon. “As we prepare to wind down in-person instruction on Tuesday, Nov. 24, in accordance with our fall 2020 academic semester calendar, it is absolutely critical that our students are tested before leaving for the Thanksgiving break.”
Tripathi said that while the university was approaching 100 cases within a 14-day period, its test positivity rate of 0.44% remained well below that of Erie County as a whole. Over a seven-day rolling average, the county’s rate was nearly 6%.
UB and other SUNY institutions have been scrambling to test students ahead of the break.
More than 11,500 UB students, faculty and staff have completed the required testing since Nov. 9, but university officials said an additional 4,200 to 4,500 students have not yet been tested.
Officials said they were concerned that a sudden shift in university operations would disrupt plans to complete the testing and prompt many students to leave for break before being tested.
While classes will continue as planned until Tuesday, the university is suspending in-person student clubs and activities and will offer only takeout service in campus dining and food service operations starting on Thursday.
Binghamton University reached the threshold of 100 positive cases by noon on Tuesday, and President Harvey G. Stenger announced the campus will halt in-person classes on Wednesday.
But Stenger also urged students to stay on campus or in their off-campus residences until the scheduled break and to report for their scheduled coronavirus tests prior to returning to their home communities for Thanksgiving.
UB plans to wrap up testing Wednesday on the North Campus in Amherst and on Thursday for students in the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences in downtown Buffalo.
Testing for faculty and staff will continue Monday and Tuesday.
In his email, Tripathi left open the possibility that in-person instruction still could end sooner than Tuesday, under the state guidelines.
But even in that event, he said all students who live or work on campus, take an in-person class on campus, or use campus services such as dining, libraries or gyms must still be tested before they leave.
Binghamton’s pause was its second of the semester. It flipped to remote-only instruction for two weeks in October, after reaching the 100-case threshold. In-person classes resumed Oct. 22.
Several other campuses across the state switched to remote only classes earlier than planned, including Niagara University and the University of Albany, both of which shut down in-person instruction on Nov. 10, following a surge of positive tests on campus.
Hilbert College in Hamburg, while it did not have a spike in cases, ended in-person classes last Friday, 10 days earlier than planned, due to the growing number of Covid-19 infections throughout Erie County. Daemen College in Amherst and Syracuse University also shifted to online instruction on Monday – about a week earlier than planned.
Other local colleges and universities were not close to the state’s threshold number on Tuesday afternoon. SUNY Buffalo State College reported 24 cases within the two-week period; Canisius College had 33 cases and SUNY Fredonia had 21 cases.
