One of my former runners said their college is shifting classes online and thinking about sending them all home. Apparently the football team keeps throwing and attending parties despite warnings and cases popping up in the team.
Other former athletes and students also say there is a rise in hybrid and fully online courses to correspond with a reduction in in person instruction.

Riding up there tomorrow. I'll be sure not to stop in Ward too long just in case it's up there, too. lol

Also: get the Gambler Sauce next time you're at Pete's. I just discovered it.

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@floathammerholdon | @partners_in_tri

 

As much as I am concerned about COVID in general, these "college outbreaks" are a lot of hype. All the data shows the students are at very low risk of death or serious complications.

If students are being asked to pay $40-50K per year for an education, it isn't unreasonable for them to want to get it in person? From what I can see, most students want to be on campus, but a lot of people decide who cares what the people with the most skin in the game think, I'm going to sit in my house where I work remotely and say they are a bunch of irresponsible fools. For all the people against colleges opening (almost all of whom have no skin in the game), what are you willing to give up or sacrifice for the students (who you expect to make a huge sacrifice, namely continuing to pay huge amounts of money for an on-line education when that's not what they signed up for). So my real point is, what I keep seeing in COVID is self-righteous people making little or no sacrifices themselves, expecting people in much worse/difficult situations than they are in, to make large sacrifices and get nothing in return. "It's like a big shit sandwich and everyone is going to have to take a bite"

People seem to fall into two extreme camps, "if it saves one life" or "the economy". There is some kind of middle ground and considering the overall risks and the benefit, colleges trying to open doesn't seem unreasonable. And to the extent they are having "massive problems", these are exaggerated, massive new case numbers alone (if people are not dying, not being hospitalized, not having serious complications in large numbers) are not a huge problem. COVID is a terrible disease and even in the places where it is "under control" (most of Western Europe) there are still dozens/hundreds of people dying every day. Concern yes, but considering how fucted up our country is right now this is far from the most serious thing we are dealing with.

And sure, things would be different if we didn't screw the pooch back in March/April. But that's water under the bridge now, we need to move forward a little bit, or if not make a specific plan for how the schools can open. And making milestones (new infections have to be at X level) is not a solution without a very specific list of actions (and how they will be funded and enforced) that will be carried to achieve the stated goal (and what individuals/organizations will be held accountable if their plans don't work). People who are against schools opening are largely taking a defeatist approach, saying we can't open them until we get to X level of cases and then walking away and throwing their hands up and saying how we get there (if we ever get there) is not their responsibility.

Baylor just had to cancel their football game this Saturday. Second game in a row. First game was the other team's fault. This time Baylor's fault.

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Favorite Gear: Dimond | Cadex | Desoto Sport | Hoka One One

The NBA looks better and better. WWII veterans also.

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Eric Reid AeroFit | Instagram Portfolio
Aerodynamic Retul Bike Fitting

“You are experiencing the criminal coverup of a foreign backed fascist hostile takeover of a mafia shakedown of an authoritarian religious slow motion coup. Persuade people to vote for Democracy.”

I would say the parents of the 63,000 k-12 kids in the two districts that go off the county numbers are sacrificing more than a little as our kids are not in school getting the education they expected and it’s impacting our jobs and livelihoods.

But either way - how long does this propagate for and how far into the surrounding community does it spread? How far should we ratchet back the few social interactions we have gotten back to.

ETA- I think if we can we should ride this pony. Sending these kids back home everywhere and propagating the problem seems like a worse idea. So, how do we best ride this out? Is it possible to get it under control without it totally blowing up on the local area? How much risk are we taking on?

In reality for me if the kids get another semester virtual I might sacrifice all the way to moving to my ski condo for nov and dec and Nordic skiing daily. Can you feel my pain?

I am not concerned about college kids getting sick. I am not concerned about my k-12 kids getting sick either. But I am concerned about college professors. I am also concerned for my 5th graders teach who is a 4 times cancer survivor.

As for defeatist attitudes, that’s the way I think about people who have given up trying to stop community spread.

College kids may feel like they are getting full value out of their overpriced private schools because they don’t get access to the new workout facility. But outside of labs, most college classes can be just as effective as I am at work if they go virtual. In the mean time my family income is going to be at least $50k lower this year, so I am not crying over the sacrifices those poor college kids are not making.

While it may be true that some or many classes can be effective if delivered online, I think it’s a fair point that this isn’t what students were sold when they agreed to pay a certain tuition. I know some schools have huge class sizes, taught by TAs, and maybe for those classes, it’s almost virtual even when it’s in person. But I also know schools with smaller class sizes tout that as a big benefit, as well as access to professors, interaction with other students, and ability to leverage everything else the school has like libraries, lab facilities, athletic facilities, etc. There’s a reason people take their kids on school visit trips, and part of that is because they’re paying for the entire experience, not just the class portions that could be taught online. If that was all they wanted, they’d sign up for any of the solely online degree programs.

I can see good argument for reducing tuition costs if a school chooses to go online only, especially because tuition costs are so ridiculously over-priced to begin with.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

You do realize that the vast majority of the faculty and staff are not college aged kids and therefore more susceptible to the virus?

Easy answer to the football team parties. Cancel the next game.

drn92

We’re 6-7 months into this and the concept that college kids will get others sick who are at risk is still confusing apparently.

I think most college kids don't understand that college is not for them.

College kids and their parents pay tuition so that:
1) Professors can do researchers on useless topics.
2) Administrators can drive nice cars and live in fancy house's.
3) The local economy can benefit from an influx of students.

College kids should stop being selfish- trying to get an education and have fun.
They should think about who college is made for- administrator's and tenured professors.

This is one of the most stupid things I've read in LR, and given I read most of Windywave's posts that's saying a great deal. You've totally nailed the reasons why people go for higher education. Thanks for distilling that down to three nonsensical points.

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"Oh man, it's going to take days to kill all these people!" - Jens Voigt

Its fucking maddening that we have to remind everyone that 18-22 year olds can infect and KILL 70+ year olds.

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Favorite Gear: Dimond | Cadex | Desoto Sport | Hoka One One

Let’s also completely ignore that there are multiple college athletes that are showing heart damage after getting it. We have absolutely no clue what the long term effects are from this, but hey the kids won’t die so fuck it who cares.

It’s insane. I don’t even know how to comprehend that people are oblivious to the basics of this.