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Stanford frosh (freshman) here. What's disappointing about this is not _that_ they cancelled — most of my friends agree that it's the prudent thing to do — but

Stanford frosh (freshman) here. What's disappointing about this is not _that_ they cancelled — most of my friends agree that it's the prudent thing to do — but that they waited so long to cancel. For context, classes start tomorrow [0]. One of my friends literally got the news about the cancellation when he landed in SFO yesterday. Just a few weeks ago, they sent us an email reaffirming their plan to bring us back, yet COVID cases in California have remained relatively flat since then. It's unclear what specifically made them pull the plug. Maybe it was the 43 students testing positive. Maybe it was the rising cases in Santa Clara County. But nine months into the pandemic, it’s hard to see these as surprises. Personally, I wish they did it two or three weeks ago. Or even a week ago. Or even last week. Just not the Saturday night before classes start. (We got this news yesterday.) The writing was on the wall the entire time — they could have saved everyone (including themselves) a lot of time and effort by just being realistic. Oh well. Surely there are sides to this I'm not seeing. [0] Classes do start tomorrow (Jan 11), but most students would move in around Jan 22. A small subset of students (RAs, international students, etc.) have been moving in over the past few days, and they won't be asked to leave.

asdfasgasdgasdg 6y ago
One factor they might have been considering: it does seem like these covid spikes reach a point, and then calm down. They might have hoped the top of the peak would have come earlier, and they might have been able to announce that it were safe to return. For example, if Cali had peaked a week ago, by the time y'all were set to move in, it would have been relatively safe.
- kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
  It's all about the Benjamins. If they gave students enough forewarning they could pursue other options.
  - gnicholas 6y ago
    You're right that such short notice puts students in a tough spot. They can apparently still request pro-rated refunds, [1] but at this point they have signed up for classes and are (or were) excited to start. 1: https://registrar.stanford.edu/tuition-refund-schedule https://registrar.stanford.edu/tuition-refund-schedule
    - NeutronStar 6y ago
      They also quit their jobs if they had one.
hkmurakami 6y ago
It's really unfortunately that you're getting whipsawed like this. With more warning you'd more easily be able to pursue internships or other opportunities. Out of curiosity, would you have been able to take the semester off had you known several weeks ago, vs now? For context, the number of daily covid-19 cases has roughly doubled in Santa Clara and San Mateo Counties over the last few weeks. That growth I imagine is the reason why the University administration pulled the plug :(
- epoch_100 6y ago
  That would make sense —- I was looking at California all together. Edited my parent comment to address this.
- epoch_100 6y ago
  > Out of curiosity, would you have been able to take the semester off had you known several weeks ago, vs now? They extended the leave of absence deadline, so I could still conceivably take the term off. But I don’t think many frosh are doing that. We’ll be off campus for the spring too no matter what (they will prioritize juniors and seniors for graduation), so it makes sense to just do it all remotely. Where the timing really sucks is on planning off-campus living away from home. I’m not endorsing leisure travel, but the thought of living at home for 6+ more months isn’t great for a lot of us. With classes starting tomorrow, though, it’s going to be tough for people to make arrangements (unless you want to move mid-way through the term, when coursework is heavy).
  - hkmurakami 6y ago
    For what it's worth, rental units (apartments & condos) across the bay have record vacancies due to remote work. That being said: 1) Single Family Home rentals are more rare, due to former SF dwellers seeking more space. (if living with roommates is preferred) SFH near campus tends to be particularly scarce / pricey. 2) Rental terms less than 12 months are rare since landlords prefer stability and want to avoid the financial and temporal cost of re-renting. 3) The commonly available units will likely be pricier than Stanford dorm rooms. 4) The friction involved to rent a regular off campus housing unit (paperwork, security deposit, etc) is more burdensome than the turn key nature of on campus housing. I imagine virtual-learning college students still prefer to live off campus but in the general area so that they can meet up with classmates off campus?
Animats 6y ago
Yes, that Stanford now has your tuition payment. (I'm an alum. Not impressed with how this has been handled.)
- epoch_100 6y ago
  They did extend the leave of absence deadline, fwiw.
powersnail 6y ago
That's just horrible. They should at least reimburse travel fees.
asdff 6y ago
Pretty irresponsible for Stanford to even initially announce a return to class a month ago, while cases were beginning to spike from thanksgiving in CA. USC in contrast has been online since march and has maintained that this will be the status quo since July. Their announcement to have spring 2021 be online came as no surprise in mid november, on anticipation of the inevitable thanksgiving surge. It strikes me as very odd that the admins at Stanford weren't looking around at what the rest of California was doing. It also surprised me to read that Bay Area schools were reopening as early as November. Mindboggling, really. LAUSD is remote this year.
tyrust 6y ago
>Just a few weeks ago, they sent us an email reaffirming their plan to bring us back, yet COVID cases in California have remained relatively flat since then. Where "flat" is 30-40k per day, which it has been since the beginning of December. Compare that to the trough of 3k/day through the summer and the late spring "peak" of 8-10k/day. Shit is the worst it has been and it isn't going to get better for a while. They made the right decision, I'm sorry that it was done so late.

asdfasgasdgasdg 6y ago

One factor they might have been considering: it does seem like these covid spikes reach a point, and then calm down. They might have hoped the top of the peak would have come earlier, and they might have been able to announce that it were safe to return. For example, if Cali had peaked a week ago, by the time y'all were set to move in, it would have been relatively safe.

kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
It's all about the Benjamins. If they gave students enough forewarning they could pursue other options.
- gnicholas 6y ago
  You're right that such short notice puts students in a tough spot. They can apparently still request pro-rated refunds, [1] but at this point they have signed up for classes and are (or were) excited to start. 1: https://registrar.stanford.edu/tuition-refund-schedule https://registrar.stanford.edu/tuition-refund-schedule
  - NeutronStar 6y ago
    They also quit their jobs if they had one.

hkmurakami 6y ago

It's really unfortunately that you're getting whipsawed like this. With more warning you'd more easily be able to pursue internships or other opportunities. Out of curiosity, would you have been able to take the semester off had you known several weeks ago, vs now? For context, the number of daily covid-19 cases has roughly doubled in Santa Clara and San Mateo Counties over the last few weeks. That growth I imagine is the reason why the University administration pulled the plug :(

epoch_100 6y ago
That would make sense —- I was looking at California all together. Edited my parent comment to address this.
epoch_100 6y ago
> Out of curiosity, would you have been able to take the semester off had you known several weeks ago, vs now? They extended the leave of absence deadline, so I could still conceivably take the term off. But I don’t think many frosh are doing that. We’ll be off campus for the spring too no matter what (they will prioritize juniors and seniors for graduation), so it makes sense to just do it all remotely. Where the timing really sucks is on planning off-campus living away from home. I’m not endorsing leisure travel, but the thought of living at home for 6+ more months isn’t great for a lot of us. With classes starting tomorrow, though, it’s going to be tough for people to make arrangements (unless you want to move mid-way through the term, when coursework is heavy).
- hkmurakami 6y ago
  For what it's worth, rental units (apartments & condos) across the bay have record vacancies due to remote work. That being said: 1) Single Family Home rentals are more rare, due to former SF dwellers seeking more space. (if living with roommates is preferred) SFH near campus tends to be particularly scarce / pricey. 2) Rental terms less than 12 months are rare since landlords prefer stability and want to avoid the financial and temporal cost of re-renting. 3) The commonly available units will likely be pricier than Stanford dorm rooms. 4) The friction involved to rent a regular off campus housing unit (paperwork, security deposit, etc) is more burdensome than the turn key nature of on campus housing. I imagine virtual-learning college students still prefer to live off campus but in the general area so that they can meet up with classmates off campus?

Animats 6y ago

Yes, that Stanford now has your tuition payment. (I'm an alum. Not impressed with how this has been handled.)

epoch_100 6y ago
They did extend the leave of absence deadline, fwiw.

powersnail 6y ago

That's just horrible. They should at least reimburse travel fees.

asdff 6y ago

Pretty irresponsible for Stanford to even initially announce a return to class a month ago, while cases were beginning to spike from thanksgiving in CA. USC in contrast has been online since march and has maintained that this will be the status quo since July. Their announcement to have spring 2021 be online came as no surprise in mid november, on anticipation of the inevitable thanksgiving surge. It strikes me as very odd that the admins at Stanford weren't looking around at what the rest of California was doing. It also surprised me to read that Bay Area schools were reopening as early as November. Mindboggling, really. LAUSD is remote this year.

tyrust 6y ago

>Just a few weeks ago, they sent us an email reaffirming their plan to bring us back, yet COVID cases in California have remained relatively flat since then. Where "flat" is 30-40k per day, which it has been since the beginning of December. Compare that to the trough of 3k/day through the summer and the late spring "peak" of 8-10k/day. Shit is the worst it has been and it isn't going to get better for a while. They made the right decision, I'm sorry that it was done so late.