BY BRYCE KELLY, STAFF WRITER
COVID-19 has brought many changes to everyday life in the past 18 months. The pandemic was looking like it was on its last legs before the Delta variant emerged and changed everything. The Delta variant forced many restrictions back on to people. These restrictions have had a big impact on schools, especially colleges. Many New York colleges had mask mandates starting at the beginning of the school year. St. Bonaventure did not.
However, St. Bonaventure did impose a mask mandate starting Sept. 20. This decision, along with others, so far have shown that SBU has botched the mask situation.
One reason the situation has been mishandled is that SBU’s plan has been too reaction-based and not proactive. My reasoning is this: Couldn’t the school have seen this early influx of cases coming? The reason being is that there are many people coming from many different areas of the country. Different areas of the country have different vaccination rates, as well as transmission rates. Was it crazy to think there would be an ominous start to the year? People could have been carrying COVID and not know because they were asymptomatic? Or they could have been carrying COVID and thought it was a cold because they are healthy young adults. But SBU did not ask for a COVID test before arrival at school. It should have.
I also wouldn’t have been opposed to masking for the first two weeks because of people coming from different areas of transmission and potentially getting COVID before they left and spreading it here at SBU. This would have stopped the transmission of the virus better and resulted in less cases.
But to start masking now doesn’t make much sense.
SBU’s announcement of the mask mandate in school buildings was posted on the Notice Board email that goes out every day. One of SBU’s main reasons was because of the HERO Act activated last week by Governor Hochul. The Notice Board read, ‘“The HERO Act, which the state developed over the summer, was triggered by the governor Sept. 7 because of the ‘substantial risk’ level of COVID transmission across the state.”’
The HERO Act makes sense in some ways because different parts of New York are struggling with COVID. However, the HERO Act is intended for employees. Students are not employees. According to the HERO Act, “This plan applies to all ‘employees’ as defined by the New York State HERO Act, which means any person providing labor or services for remuneration for a private entity or business within the state.”
For SBU to reference that part of the HERO Act doesn’t make a ton of sense. This mask mandate doesn’t make a ton of sense because the campus only has four active COVID cases as of Tuesday, Sept. 21. Four out of over 2,000. That’s a very small percentage.
One may argue that SBU is trying to be proactive. However, we’ve been here for almost a month. The case numbers have decreased here and they are decreasing in Cattaraugus County since the mask mandate has been imposed.
Leave the masking up to the teachers. They are in charge of their lectures. But not all lectures are the same, especially at a small school like this. I am in a class that is tightly packed with an older professor. Masks are required. That makes perfect sense because if the professor got COVID, they’d be in trouble. I also have a class with seven people. We sit all over the place and have plenty of space. The professor didn’t require masks before the mandate. It made sense.
It doesn’t make sense to require masks in the Hickey either. The school hasn’t changed the seating arrangements. People are still close together. People have them off anyways since they are eating and talking at the same time. I witnessed a few people walking around without them on Monday.
With the case levels we have right now, it should be a personal choice for teachers inside the classroom and students outside the classroom. If you don’t feel comfortable, wear a mask. Everyone has different circumstances. For the moment, SBU hasn’t done the best job with COVID so far this year. There is still time for that to change. Let’s see how they adapt to future circumstances.
