Students’ college plans change as virus drives changes on campus
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When Ethan Wyman graduated from Fox Chapel Area High School a semester early last winter, his plans were pretty much set.
The O’Hara Township teen would keep working at Giant Eagle and then head to the University of Pittsburgh at Greensburg campus this fall. He and his family liked the small-school feel of the regional campus, located in Hempfield. He had a room in the Academic Village, an apartment-style dorm, and was excited about meeting new friends and starting his studies in business management.
“We were all set for him to move in,” said his mother, Angela Bullers Wyman. “Then we found out that four out of five of his classes had been moved online. Financially, it just wasn’t worth it for him to live in a dorm and take classes online. So he decided to stay home and do his fall semester at CCAC (the Community College of Allegheny County).
“It’s been a huge disappointment all around, but he can take the same classes there and then transfer.”
The Wymans aren’t alone.
Families across the country are having second thoughts about the high cost of shipping students off to colleges that are reopening with severe restrictions on campus life and with many, if not all, classes online.
Colleges that invested countless hours and money writing plans to safely open campuses that shuttered last spring are faced with the prospect of yet more last-minute decisions as covid-19 caseloads surged this summer.
Would families stressed by the economic downturn and the threat of the virus opt to keep students at home? Would students underwriting their own costs be willing to pay for online classes that many complained did not meet their needs?
Local college leaders say they are keeping their fingers crossed as the start of class approaches.
“That’s been a concern across the board,” said Thomas Foley, president of the Association of Independent Colleges and Universities of Pennsylvania.
While a handful of colleges opted to go entirely online this fall, many are trying to offer at least some classes in person.
Many recall a Carnegie Dartlet survey of 2,800 high school seniors in May that found about a third said they would defer or cancel plans to attend college this fall if classes went entirely online.
Foley’s Harrisburg-based group represents more than 90 private nonprofit colleges and universities scattered across the state. Membership ranges from the University of Pennsylvania, an Ivy League school in Philadelphia, to Seton Hill University, a small Catholic school in Greensburg.
“So much of the experience at these schools is about being on campus, and trying to replicate that is hard,” Foley said.
Moreover, the cost of doing that last spring when campuses abruptly shuttered because of the coronavirus pandemic was staggering. As of mid-May, Foley’s member schools estimated they had lost about $426 million, a combination of costs attributed to refunding room and board fees and ramping up to offer all classes online.
Public colleges and universities, likewise, incurred new costs. The University of Pittsburgh alone estimated its pandemic costs last spring at $30 million to $40 million. And the 14 universities in the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education pegged their losses at $100 million.
Although subsidies from the federal CARES Act reimbursed schools for some losses, most said it didn’t cover everything. And the costs kept adding up as schools adopted new safety protocols, including deep cleaning, rearranging classrooms and limiting class size and resident hall populations in anticipation of reopening.
A July survey of college presidents by the American Council on Education found new safety protocols and fall enrollment were among the most pressing issues for college leaders — with 66% citing safety protocols and 56% citing fall enrollment as their top concerns.
“I think the greatest pressure they’re under is how to reopen and reopen safely,” said Barbara Mistick, president of the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities.
Schools committed to reopening campuses for in-person classes faced yet another road block when some states began announcing travelers from states with surging infection rates would have to quarantine.
“Washington, D.C., has listed 27 states that if you’re coming from them you have to quarantine. And 40% to 50% of the students at colleges there are from out of state. It’s just gotten extraordinarily messy,” Mistick said.
Price break
Despite strained finances, many public and private universities broke with decades of increases in tuition and room and board prices and froze prices this year. Many reduced activity fees and related costs as they moved to hybrid or online schedules for the upcoming semester.
Nevertheless, families and students say colleges should have lower prices. Some said they were caught unaware and faced unnecessary costs as colleges announced last-minute changes that put a crimp in their plans.
Madison Borkovich, who was nominated to Penn State’s Presidential Leadership Academy after completing her freshman year at the school’s University Park campus last spring, was among those who couldn’t see paying top dollar to sit in a dorm room and take classes online.
“That wouldn’t have been healthy for me or my roommate,” she said.
When it became clear the fall semester would resume with a mixture of online and in-person classes, she organized friends and fellow classmates to lobby for a tuition reduction. That effort failed.
The Cheswick woman said she decided to enroll in Penn State’s Global Online program this fall, stay home and take advantage of opportunities to pick up work as a tutor and nanny.
“I was very involved on campus,” she said. “It was a heartbreaking situation.”
Debra Smallwood said her daughter Maya, who will be a junior this fall at Slippery Rock University, wasn’t as fortunate.
Like tens of thousands of college students who live off campus, Maya and her roommate had to sign a lease last winter to reserve a $750-a-month apartment for the upcoming school year. The women split utilities, so each pays about $450 a month for housing.
Until late last month, it looked as though living in the small college town an hour north of Pittsburgh made sense. At least half of her classes were supposed to be in person. Then, Slippery Rock severely limited in-person instruction. That decision meant Smallwood would be paying to live in Slippery Rock and take classes online.
“Her landlord won’t entertain them breaking the lease. Their only option would be to sublet, and there’s no market for that,” Smallwood said.
Maya Smallwood is planning to continue her studies this fall from her apartment.
Her mother, meanwhile, has joined an online Slippery Rock parents group. Many of them are upset about events beyond their control. She said it is clear students vastly prefer attending class in person, and many parents question whether they are getting what they’re paying for with online education. For some, sitting out the year isn’t out of the question.
“A lot of people in the group are having that conversation,” Smallwood said.