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THE HARVARD CRIMSON | MARCH 11. 2020
Seniors Party, Lament Move-Out By EMA R. SCHUMER CRIMSON STAFF WRITER
Harvard College seniors spent time with friends in dining halls and at outdoor parties in the balmy weather Tuesday while they processed the University’s decision to send students home amid concerns over coronavirus. In interviews, 12 members of the Class of 2020 grappled with the announcement, which could mark a premature coda to their time at Harvard. These seniors described emotions ranging from denial to nostalgia to confusion. Nicole M. Daurio ’20 was still processing the news alongside friends in the Kirkland House dining hall hours after the announcement went out. Daurio said she felt “numb.” “I don’t really know how I feel,” Daurio said. “You’ve just been told that your college career is over, you’re being kicked out of your House of three years, you’re having to say bye to your friends.” She also lamented the uncertainty around plans for this year’s commencement ceremonies. “Are we going to all Zoom into our commencement?” she asked, referencing the online teleconference platform Harvard plans to use for virtual classes. Daurio said that, if commencement exercises do take place, she will not be able to afford flying back to campus from her home in California. University President Lawrence S. Bacow announced the decision to move all Harvard courses online as a result of the global spread of coronavirus in
Baker Declares State Emergency
By FIONA K. BRENNAN CRIMSON STAFF WRITER
G overnor Charlie D. Baker ’79 declared a state of emergency in Massachusetts Tuesday after the number of recorded coronavirus cases in the state doubled overnight. As of Tuesday evening, there were 973 cases in the United States and 29 deaths. Massachusetts saw 92 cases of coronavirus reported, up from 41 on Monday. At least 32 recorded cases of coronavirus in the state are connected to people who attended a Biogen conference at a Boston hotel on Feb. 26 and 27, where three employees later tested positive for coronavirus. Massachusetts joined eight states, including New York, California, Rhode Island, and Maryland, in declaring a state of emergency. Baker said at a news conference that he declared the state of emergency to give his administration more “flexibility” to respond to the outbreak. “We believe it’s important to start taking more aggressive action now to mitigate spread based on the information we have available,” Baker said. Baker added in the news conference that officials expect the outbreak to cause disruptions and that immediate steps needed to be taken to combat it. “The efforts to mitigate the spread of this virus will be disruptive. We expect this disruption to continue for the foreseeable future and understand it will cause inconvenience for
In response to the University’s announcement, seniors in Winthrop House commemorate the unprecedented ending to their Harvard experience with alcohol. RYAN N. GAJARAWALA—CRIMSON PHOTOGRAPHER
an email to University affiliates Tuesday morning. He also wrote that students should not return to Cambridge after spring break, which starts Saturday. Other members of the Class of 2020 said they were scrambling to create a capstone experience before moving out of their dorms. Many chose to spend the day partying. Devin C. Judd ’20 was carrying a box of Corona hard seltzers from the C’est Bon liquor store in Harvard Square to the Owl Club late Tuesday morning. He said he planned to spend his last days on campus “packing and drinking.” “Senior spring’s supposed
to be the best and we have to fit it in two days, three days,” he said. C’est Bon manager Tony R. Daher said his business experienced greater traffic Tuesday morning as undergraduates stocked up on alcohol. He said students entered his store beginning around 10 a.m., though on most other days he “never saw students in the morning.” In the Kirkland courtyard, roughly ten seniors sat in chairs playing beer darts and listening to the country hit “Chicken Fried” by Zac Brown Band. Oliver L. Sughrue ’20 said he understood Harvard’s decision to move classes online, but
felt disappointed that he and his friends only had a few days to leave campus. In the courtyard, he said they were “taking a personal day.” “We’re a really close-knit group, my blockmates, and it’s hard for us to say goodbye,” Sughrue said. “And this might not be the best way to say goodbye, but it’s the natural reaction.” Sughrue explained why he and other seniors were celebrating Tuesday. “We’re trying to get happier so we don’t get too sad because we’re all really sad about saying goodbye,” he said. ema.schumer@thecrimson.com
many,” Baker said. “But our goal needs to be to significantly increase efforts to mitigate the spread of this disease now.” Boston’s St. Patrick’s Day parade was cancelled on Tuesday, according to Mayor Martin J. Walsh. The Boston Marathon is still scheduled to take place April 20, though the situation is “fluid.” Baker’s state of emergency announcement came the same day Harvard administrators
The efforts to mitigate the spread of this virus will be disruptive. We expect this disruption to continue for the forseeable future and understand it will cause inconvenience for many. Charlie D. Baker ‘79 Governor of Massachusetts
informed students that they must leave campus by Sunday and that classes after spring break will be held online. MIT also announced Tuesday that it would move to online classes following spring break and told undergraduate students to not return to campus. fiona.brennan@thecrimson.com
EXPERTS FROM PAGE 1
Public Health Experts Largely Support University’s Decision “drastic,” the nature of the institution places it in a “unique situation.” “People are coming from all over the country — in fact, all over the world — and it’s impossible to gauge the likelihood that every single student was or was not exposed to the coronavirus,” Goldmann said. “As people say all the time now, out of an abundance of caution, this is the step that was taken,” Khurana advised students experiencing difficulties leaving campus on such short notice to contact their resident deans and consult a list of frequently-asked questions. Topics covered by the FAQs range from the continuity of Harvard University Health Services resources, to financial support for travel expenses, to potential disruptions to academic programming. Marc Lipsitch, the director of the Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics at the School of Public Health, said the decision was ultimately necessary because of the imminence of a coronavirus outbreak and the nature of students’ living situations. “I think we were some days or weeks away from hav-
ing a really big problem on our hands, and the only thing we can do to slow it down is to slow down transmission,” Lipsitch said. “Dorms are not quite cruise ships, but they are pretty densely packed, and some of them aren’t very well ventilated.” “It’s just better to be in places other than dorms,” he added. Goldmann said the transition to virtual learning would almost certainly impact the teaching quality of most classes. “It’s very unlikely that the quality of teaching for every class will be what it is if they were here in person,” Goldmann said. “Let’s face it, most of the professors and the teaching fellows have never taught at any scale virtually.” He added that with Harvard’s “international and increasingly diverse” student body, the University must take measures to support students who might “suffer” from the disruption. “I think Harvard has an enormous responsibility to care for students who are displaced by this,” Goldmann said. “Harvard is going to have to get it together to really look
out for all of the students who are going to not just be inconvenienced, but perhaps even suffer as a result of this.” Khurana acknowledged that students may feel “disappointment” with the news but said further instruction would be provided soon on how students can meet the fast turnaround. “I do not take lightly the apprehension and disappointment you will experience with this news. In the coming days our faculty and staff will be working diligently to implement plans to best support you during this transition,” Khurana said. Kenneth McIntosh ’58, a pediatrics professor at Harvard Medical School, said that while the decision to send students off campus was not guaranteed to curb the spread of coronavirus, it was still a smart move. “I’m sure that the effort is to try to avoid that and minimize the epidemic. Whether it will be successful or not is not entirely clear, but I think that it’s better to do something that makes epidemiologic sense at this point than to wait,” McIntosh said.
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