Return to university

[SouthCoastShell]

I've just watched all of Boris's announcement and he doesn't mention when students can return to university. Does anyone know when students are allowed to return?

@Phphion

Universities have to make their own risk assessments about whether to allow their students to return to university-owned accommodation based on their own considerations for the students, staff and, importantly, wider community.

Our students can all come back to halls if they want. We have offered them a rent rebate to discourage them from doing so, but if they want to, they can come.

But we are an out-of-town campus university and our first year students are notorious for never leaving the campus even in normal times. Consequently, the risk of them sparking a third wave of infection, and particularly infection with new variants, in the local population is relatively small.

A university that is much more integrated into a city, where the students mix significantly with the local resident population could not afford to be so free with allowing students to return. They have a responsibility to the community that they are part of, not just to their own students.

I think the point about a uni in a city having responsibility to its neighbours is quite niche given schools are back. I get it, it sounds nice but also bizarre given students will just be in their own cities etc instead!

The point is to contain infection and limit spread of new variants through the country. School children don't travel across the country to get to their school. If there is a new variant in their community, it stays there because they stay there. Likewise with the students who are at home. If they start travelling to all the different cities across the UK, carrying the infection with them, then soon the whole of the UK will be infected.

Carrying infection? They have a test done at home before they leave and one when they arrive. We're doing 2 tests a week here as D2 is in school. It's ridiculous and unfair to treat students like plague rats.

We aren't allowed to require our students to be tested. We can only offer them tests and advise that they should take them.

DS’s university has had highly effective testing of “households” in place since October.

@Phphion

The point is to contain infection and limit spread of new variants through the country. School children don't travel across the country to get to their school. If there is a new variant in their community, it stays there because they stay there. Likewise with the students who are at home. If they start travelling to all the different cities across the UK, carrying the infection with them, then soon the whole of the UK will be infected.

Mute point when there are no restrictions on travelling around the UK for other purposes, such as UK holidays, work, visiting relatives, shopping etc. Why single out students?

Even muter point that all elderly/vulnerable adults have been offered the vaccine and infection rates etc are now very low.

It's unacceptable and unfair to treat one group of the population differently to everyone else.

@user1497207191 - totally agree. And students only travel at the start and end of term and stay put. Holidaymakers travel into new areas for short periods and return home thereby are surely more of an issue for infection control than students who 'stay put' for two or more months.

@Phphion

The point is to contain infection and limit spread of new variants through the country. School children don't travel across the country to get to their school. If there is a new variant in their community, it stays there because they stay there. Likewise with the students who are at home. If they start travelling to all the different cities across the UK, carrying the infection with them, then soon the whole of the UK will be infected.

Sadly I think that horse bolted with the kent variant that spread within days! Also with business and holiday travel happening again in June spread, Sept really should be normal for unis.

[quote sandybayley]@user1497207191 - totally agree. And students only travel at the start and end of term and stay put. Holidaymakers travel into new areas for short periods and return home thereby are surely more of an issue for infection control than students who 'stay put' for two or more months.[/quote]
I’ve got 5 trips booked around the uk for work and holiday. Far more than the average student 🤷‍♀️

I think unis could ‘require’ students and staff to test? Seems reasonable if schools and other work places are now. We seem to have warehouses full of them avail.

What is allowed and what individual institutions consider responsible given their own circumstances are different things.

The government has allowed people to go on holiday, but it is up to individual hotels, B&Bs, etc. to decide if they think it is responsible for them to open their accommodation and so encourage people to come. Similarly, students are allowed to travel to the environs of their university whenever they want, but it is up to each individual university whether they think it is responsible for them to provide accommodation to encourage the students to come.

This is the current situation faced by universities. Whether it continues in September is a different question. Whether there will be face-to-face teaching is a separate issue to whether students can live in halls of residence and other university-owner accommodation.

@Newgirls

I think unis could ‘require’ students and staff to test? Seems reasonable if schools and other work places are now. We seem to have warehouses full of them avail.

Many Universities have testing centres on campus for staff and students with no symptoms. Ours has been up and running since December.

If it is the universities making these risk assessments, why are they hiding behind government guidance and implying the government makes the decisions?

You cannot have it both ways.

It is discrimination law which thankfully is fueling recent successful litigation rather than (my view) all the rules breach our human rights.

So if the Uk retired population can now travel to their holiday cottages and mingle far and wide in England but students cannot that may be something that could be subject to a successful legal challenge just as the Sacha Lord case which was won recently found the substantial meal rule was discriminatory 9which rule has now gone) and the recent attempt in Scotland to ban church services was held to be unlawful.

Age discrimination generally is illegal although not quite in the same way as other things like sex discrimination so possibly that could be a conduit for a letter before action to be sent to the state by a group representing 1m students - that we let 10m over 65 year olds travel for short breaks but not 1m students.

Universities may be businesses like guesthouses but they are also providing an educational experience of which some halls accommodation would be part. You cannot present it as the same service without the accommodation access. A guesthouse would close in its entirety.

We have extensive testing facilities, but we cannot require the students to use them.

If it is an insurance issue, then presumably the universities could be held liable for excluding and damaging the students

The uptake of twice weekly voluntary testing at DS’s university was very high in the first term.

I think unis could ‘require’ students and staff to test

At my uni, that is already the case for staff on campus and will continue next term. Students are asked to test.

Durham and Birmingham have both said that they're waiting for the government to clarify.

The Sutton Trust have tweeted this...

So if the Uk retired population can now travel to their holiday cottages and mingle

Any age can travel to self contained holiday accommodation, and mingling is also permitted through the steps without reference to age

Young people can help sever mix in schools to an extent which other people in other settings are not permitted to do so (groups of 30 indoors is some months away)

So the question is surely whether HE should be more like schools.

Not every student can be offered a place in halls, so I'm not so sure that the idea that it would be held an essential part of university life

Universities have been treated differently to schools because the students are adults therefore more at risk of contracting/spreading Covid. We were continually told schools were "safe"!
Come the autumn term the tables will have turned though. Surely universities full of vaccinated adults will be safer than schools full of unvaccinated children?

Treatment of students has been appalling.

It seems clear that when the government encouraged them back to uni last September, it was to lock them into paying fees for the whole year even though they’ve only had part of the year on campus.

Of course, coaxing fees from students saved the government from having to bail out universities.

How infuriating to see Boris trumpeting the £50 million student hardship fund as if it is a generous boon. There are over two million uni students in the U.K. This amounts to £25 each!

@Flyonawalk

Treatment of students has been appalling.

It seems clear that when the government encouraged them back to uni last September, it was to lock them into paying fees for the whole year even though they’ve only had part of the year on campus.

Of course, coaxing fees from students saved the government from having to bail out universities.

How infuriating to see Boris trumpeting the £50 million student hardship fund as if it is a generous boon. There are over two million uni students in the U.K. This amounts to £25 each!

I agree, but Unis also share the blame. Some changed their websites immediately after the deadline for accepting places/accommodation. Before then, lots of promises of "near normal" but after deadline day, the websites changed to "some face to face". Online history shows the webpage changes at a time when govt guidance didn't change.

Hotels, air b and bs are booked out to the max! I havent heard of any saying we aren’t open!!

They are in a for a boom year. I don’t buy the argument that unis are being somehow ‘more responsible’. They are however bowing to union staff pressure to stay online as some staff seem to prefer it.

Saying students have to take the tests seems reasonable surely, especially compared to no face to face. Seems unis are running out of reasons to justify home working.