Syracuse University administrators, unlike those of other universities, should ensure that students take responsibility for coronavirus outbreaks on campus instead of only blaming the virus. 

When the University of Alabama reported 1,201 cases of COVID-19 on its campus as of Aug. 27, President Stuart Bell said, “Our challenge is not the students … Our challenge is the virus.” While Bell acknowledged that students are facing consequences for reckless behavior, his statement moved responsibility for the infections away from students who can exercise self-control and placed it solely on the virus.

While making students understand that they have a responsibility to prevent the spread of COVID-19 is challenging, allowing this challenge to stand in the way of public health is unacceptable. 

The challenge that most college campuses are facing is students’ perceptions of the virus. Someone who understands COVID-19 is a serious threat will not attend large gatherings and disobey public health guidelines, but those who do not see the virus as a threat will.

Justine Hastings, president of SU’s Student Association, agrees. For Hastings, the responsibility for preventing COVID-19 rests heavily on SU administrators keeping students accountable. 

Prior to the start of on-campus instruction, more than 100 freshmen gathered on the Quad and did not practice social distancing. The Department of Public Safety did not arrive on the scene for about 30 minutes. SU has not seen a significant spike in cases in the weeks following the gathering.

“I cannot wrap my head around how the Department of Public Safety did not initially catch 100-plus students gathering in the middle of campus before it got to the point it did,” Hastings said. 

SU administration needs to work with DPS to be vigilant at all times and break up any gathering. While students may have been at fault, the administration must instill the idea that such gatherings are unacceptable. The university’s decision to resume on-campus classes brought on these responsibilities that we can’t afford to ignore.

“The administration, they made a decision to come back, that was their decision, now they have to ensure it was the right one,” said Ryan Golden, SA vice president. “The challenge in my eyes is that we, as a community, we need to come together to beat the virus.”

Coming together to prevent infections seems to be a common sentiment among students. The irony of Bell’s comments, which fail to hold students accountable, is that many students accept the responsibility to keep campus safe this fall. 

“I think students definitely realize we need to take it seriously in order to keep ourselves and the people around us safe,” said SU senior Aidan Halligan. “I think that everyone is taking it upon themselves to decide what they are comfortable with, but that might not be what’s in the interest of the campus as a whole.” 

All students should be conscientious of how their actions can harm others and should be held accountable for unsafe behavior, Hastings said. Large gatherings are irresponsible and threaten the community’s health, she said. 

Most students understand this. It’s why there was such anger after the Quad gathering.

“To see the freshmen gathering on the Quad felt like a slap in the face to those doing the right things and following protocols,” Halligan said. 

We students have a choice. We can be safe and considerate to the SU and greater Syracuse community or we can bask in our social spheres with disregard for everyone else. If there’s an outbreak at SU, students will be partly to blame. But if we’re successful? It’s a victory by the students and for the community. 

“We have about 13 weeks left in the semester, and that means we have 13 weeks to either keep ourselves safe or ruin this for everyone,” Golden said. 

While the president of the University of Alabama pushes the responsibility of preventing an outbreak away from its students, students at SU should be smart enough to realize that protecting against COVID-19 is their duty. 

If there is an outbreak here, the blame will be on the students. To suggest otherwise is not only wrong but is also a dangerous rhetoric to spread, and one that SU administrators need to be wise enough to reject. 

Rachel Pierce is a senior broadcast and digital journalism and political science major. Her column appears bi-weekly. She can be reached at repierce@syr.edu. She can be followed on Twitter at @rpiercesyr.

Published on September 7, 2020 at 9:04 pm