Students walk past Wilson Library on the campus of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Jonathan Drake | Reuters
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill announced Monday that it is canceling canceling undergraduate classes and moving them completely to distance learning following an outbreak of coronavirus that spread rapidly across campus just two weeks after students returned. for the fall semester.
University administrators made the announcement just a week after classes began on campus, which has about 30,000 students. The entire UNC system has more than 200,000 students, but university officials said the decision only applied to their Chapel Hill campus, which was one of the largest universities in the country to decide on person classes. held for the fall semester amid the pandemic.
The school said in a statement Monday that the Covid-19 “positive” rate jumped to 13.6% as on Sunday from 2.8% a week earlier. Some 135 students and staff tested positive last week, according to the university’s online coronavirus dashboard.
“As of this morning, we have tested 954 students and have 177 in isolation and 349 in quarantine, both on and off campus.” The university has just four remaining quarantine rooms, according to its online coronavirus dashboard, which was updated earlier Monday.
Because of the rise in cases, the university will on Wednesday shift all undergraduate personal courses on its Chapel Hill campus to distance learning, the university said. Courses at schools for graduates, professionals and health professionals will “continue to be taught as they are, or as directed by the schools.”
The university did not say if distance learning would be arranged throughout the semester, but offered to cancel reservation house reserves without penalty.
“We understand the concerns and frustrations that these changes will increase for many students and parents,” UNC Chapel Hill Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz and Provost Robert Blouin said in a statement. “As far as we believe we have worked hard to create a healthy and safe living and learning environment on campus, we believe the current data present an untenable situation.”
University and school administrators review the situation at UNC and other universities that have already brought students back to campus for any indication on how and whether schools can safely re-learn in person.
Since last week, the university has revealed at least four clusters of infections that were returned to homes and a fraternity, according to student newspaper The Daily Tar Heel.
Earlier Monday, Barbara Rimer, dean of public health at UNC-Chapel Hill, wrote in a statement that “it’s time for an off-ramp.”
“After just one week of campus operations, with a growing number of clusters and insufficient control over the off-campus behavior of students (and others), it’s time for an off-ramp,” she said. “We tried to make this work, but it did not work.”
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