Did online courses stop the spread or enable gatherings?

On Monday, Jan. 18, many students were taking the day off from classes, prepping for the upcoming week, or volunteering in their community when they got an unexpected email from the Wofford News headlined, “Wofford to go remote for two weeks.”

This email, signed by President Samhat, stated that our campus community had “more than 42% of the total [cases] from the entire fall semester.” Their solution? Lock down, go remote, and enforce regular testing.

Many people questioned the effectiveness of this decision and continue to do so as many people were seen on social media posting from various exotic locations. One freshman girl posted on her Instagram a picture with several other unmasked Wofford students with the caption, “we only ZOOM from the hot tub,” followed with #onlinewofford.

On Jan. 27, the Wofford coronavirus statistics showed that cases were at a high of 161 students.

Prior to this, as indicated in the lockdown email sent 9 days earlier, cases were only at 63.

Wofford Administration, on Friday, Jan. 29, 2021, indirectly alluded to this concern by deciding that the best decision for our Wofford community would be to continue with online education for another week, resuming in-person instruction on Feb. 9.

When asking various students how they feel about going online/continuing for another week, there was an overwhelmingly negative response. Students like Evangeline Lutz, Ryana Privott, Wilson Oswald, and Nora Crouch all believe that the increase in cases on campus is not due to the classroom, but, rather, due to a disregard to the rules.

Every student interviewed said that they believed that they were following the off-campus rules, but the on-campus rules are another story.

An anonymous Resident Assistant explained, “despite the increase in cases on our hall alone, there has been a great lack of concern for the rules on our hall…boys voices are heard on an all-girls hall, people aren’t wearing masks in the hallway, and group gatherings are still occurring. Despite having 6 or more cases on our hall over a period of 4 weeks, there is still a great deal of violations occurring.”