Students remain cautiously optimistic for spring amidst Omicron variant

“It works pretty smoothly,” Sweeney said. “We’ve got almost 17,600 students and right now they all have to come through here.”

Environmental biology freshman Katie Laparne completed her pre-arrival check-in and testing on Monday at the stadium. Laparne said her check-in went smoothly, however, she was worried to see little to no social distancing as students waited in line. Despite this, she said she is hopeful the arrival protocols and enhanced testing will allow students to remain in person. 

Policy studies sophomore Ryleigh Lenning said she is less optimistic about the spring semester given the emergence of new variants. As a commuter, Lenning said she is concerned with the repercussions of bringing thousands of students back to campus for the Syracuse and Onondaga County community. 

“I know Syracuse is doing their best with precautions, but I don’t think it’s enough,” Lenning said. “I work in retail, so public-facing, and we’re struggling to keep staff, so I can’t imagine inviting thousands of students back here will improve that situation at all. Even if they’re testing there’s only so much you can do.”

As a Resident Advisor, African American studies and social studies education senior Torian Clarke said she was tasked with checking residents’ pre-arrival tests if they arrived outside of the 8 a.m. – 9 p.m. time frame that the Ensley check-in site was open. According to Clarke, residents were not permitted to enter their dorm until they provided documentation of their pre-arrival test.

“I wish Ensley had longer hours just for the RAs sake because we were checking PCR tests, and I’m not a nurse, I’m a student,” Clarke said. “…You know, you sign up for a position and you don’t expect to be checking medical documents, but I guess that’s everyone’s change in their role with COVID.”

According to Sweeney, having worked at the Carrier Dome for over 33 years, he has seen the University adapt and roll out testing as the pandemic evolves. He hopes that students can remain on-campus and in-person this semester. 

“I don’t want to see outbreaks,” Sweeney said. “If we get so many cases we’ll have to go remote, and I don’t want to see that. With [students] and staff it’s well over 20,000 [people] so it’s pretty tough to contain.” 

According to SU’s COVID-19 Dashboard, as of January 24, there were 76 new cases of the virus, bringing the total active case count to 199, 120 of which are students. 

In his 2022 Winter Message to the University Community, Chancellor Kent Syverud spoke to what the spring semester will look like in the face of the ongoing pandemic. 

“Despite the pandemic impacting every aspect of our operations, we persevered and succeeded this past semester, but each semester has presented different challenges … We will continue to persevere and succeed by putting science first and being flexible and patient as COVID-19 evolves from a pandemic to an endemic illness,” Syverud said.