COVID-19 Pandemic Controversies

In 2020, the university closed completely for the remainder of the Spring 2020 semester. However, by Fall 2020, things were back in-person in a limited capacity. Strict regulations were to be followed by faculty and students alike. Many controversies came up from how UB handled communications, testing, and state regulations.

Regulations

Once the vaccine became available to everyone state- and nation-wide, it became required to get the vaccination to attend classes. Before that point, students and faculty with in-person interactions would be randomly selected to test for COVID. After a while, it was required that students would get tested weekly for COVID if they were to be on-campus in any capacity. Testing sites were set up in various locations around campus such as Greiner and Talbert Halls. The testing sites were not of much use given that (per a COVID dashboard that no longer exists) a very small minority of the entire student body was following through with weekly testing and the positive test rate on-campus with such a large number of unexposed students getting tested every week sat at less than 1%.

Per state regulations, UB created a rolling two-week period of tracking cases where they would report the number of tests - positive and negative - that went through their system in over a two-week period. Campus would remain open as long as there were not 100 positive cases in a given two-week period. It was planned that for the Fall 2020 semester, campus would remain closed after Thanksgiving break and classes and finals would go online.

Students who were to be on campus at this time were required to complete a daily health checklist on their phone which would ask them about symptoms or possiblity of COVID. Passing this check allowed them to be on campus.

Through the Fall 2021 semester, extra time was put between classes, allotting for 20 minutes instead of the regular 10 minutes. This allowed instructional faculty and custodial staff to sanitize rooms between classes.

Controversies

Numerous controversies came from UB's implementation of their COVID policies. Early into the semester, there was a brief spike of COVID cases that was still well below the threshold for closing campus. However, it was noted as worth keeping an eye on. With no evidence, the university and President Tripathi sent emails to any off-campus housing in the area to stop any partying, gatherings, etc. Evidence would later show that COVID spikes were on-campus, not off-campus and yet no retractions or apologies were made.

UB was also criticized heavily for its methods of testing. The weekly COVID testing was considered a waste of time and resources. A majority of students did not follow the testing and even those who did had a positive test rating well below the national and state averages. Additionally, the daily checklist was purely honor system based and had no merit. Students had no incentive to fill it out honestly given saying "yes" to even having a stuffy nose would lead them to be "disqualified" from coming to campus.

The biggest controversy came when a week before Thanksgiving break in 2020, the COVID case counter spiked over the 100-case limit and per state regulation, the university should have shut down immediately without any further notice. However, despite an insistence on following regulations strictly, UB did not close down a week early and remained open over the threshold, violating state policy. This did not sit well with students given the unwarranted harrassment thrown at them over the early stages of the pandemic. No legal action ever came of UB violating state regulation in this regard.

Pushing more time between classes led to many issues. While wipes and hand sanitizer was installed across campus in nearly every room, understaffing due to the pandemic led to not every room always having proper supplies for cleaning rooms promptly. Additionally, students did not need extra time to physically move from one classroom to the next. Often, students had classes in the same building right down the hall. This led to gatherings of students outside classrooms for longer periods of time more than usual. This extra time also limited the time slots throughout the day for classes. This pushed classes late into the night and onto Saturdays. Some departments ran into unintentional issues where classes and/or lab sessions were inadvertently scheduled at the same time as weekend midterm exams.