Why Shutting Down Colleges only Shifts the Coronavirus Burden onto Others

Shortly after 8 p.m. on Monday, our college’s pristine new Science Center more closely resembled a corporate call center. Students abandoned their work and phoned home to deliver the news: An email from the college’s president had announced that the growing covid-19 threat had prompted the school to cancel in-person classes for the rest of the semester. Students were directed to vacate campus and not return after spring break next week; the academic year would be completed with online classes beginning March 23.

We attend Amherst College, one of the first schools to make such a move — even though there had been no coronavirus infections detected on campus. Amherst has been joined by Harvard, Georgetown University, the University of California at Berkeley and many others in stopping in-person classes for varying lengths of time.

Thirty minutes after the announcement, students with a thousand questions thronged a student government meeting that normally would have been sparsely attended. And later, a sit-in at the library stretched on until the early morning. None of us knew what to make of the email that had upended our lives. Instead of worrying about exams and homework, now we were scrambling to book last-minute travel home.

There were and still are plenty of misgivings about the hasty switch to online classes. For seniors doing research and writing theses, or any student in a lab class, moving online is nearly impossible. The same is true for students in dance, music and studio art. Even when specific equipment or physical proximity isn’t required, teaching and learning will inevitably be less effective over video.