Professors from several of the state’s regional universities appeared before the legislature’s higher education committee Thursday to complain about a disparate system of coronavirus testing as students return to campuses that they see as unfair.
“This is a difficult and stressful time, but we cannot allow COVID-19 to pick winners and losers within the state of Connecticut, and I’m sorry to say this is happening right under our noses,” Central Connecticut State University Professor John O’Connor said.
“The COVID crisis is bringing to light the inequality that defines our state and is bringing into light an important failing that students and faculty are treated differently from institution to institution.”
Under guidelines developed by the state Department of Public Health, all students returning to any college or university in the state must present a negative COVID-19 test when they come to school or be tested by the school and quarantine while awaiting results.
In addition, at least 10% must be tested every week thereafter for the entire semester. The plan doesn’t call for any testing of faculty or commuting students, which includes all community college students and many at the regional universities.
Josh Geballe, the state’s chief operating officer, said the focus is on testing residential students because they will be living in a congregate setting where the virus has shown it can spread quickly.
“It’s really focused on people just living together who are sharing the same facilities such as the same bathrooms or living on the same dorm floor,” Geballe said.
Under the DPH guidelines, professors are treated like anyone else who goes to work and then goes home. If they aren’t feeling well, they are to inform school officials who can take their temperature or determine that they shouldn’t come to campus.
More than 1,100 faculty at the state’s community colleges and regional universities have signed a petition that was presented to the state Board of Regents for Higher Education expressing their concerns about not only the testing disparity but also other work-related issues that haven’t been addressed such as requiring professors to be on campus teaching their classes live even if they have only a few students present with most others online.
“In the midst of this pandemic, the [Connecticut State Colleges and Universities] administration — unlike the UConn administration which has stated faculty has the discretion to choose whether to teach in person or online — has taken the aggressive position to require faculty to come to campus,” Southern Connecticut State University Professor Cynthia Stretch said.
Many schools are going above the standards presented by DPH, including UConn, which is testing all faculty that will be on campus as well as residential students. Yale will be testing almost all its faculty and staff weekly.
“There is a stark contrast between [Connecticut State Colleges and Universities] measures for testing and those proposed by other higher institutions of learning in the state,” Central Connecticut State University Professor David Blitz said.
Blitz acknowledged there are schools far wealthier than the CSCU schools “but that doesn’t explain why the institutions that have the highest portion of low- and middle-income students and the highest proportion of minority students have the least amount of testing.”
“I think we can do more, a mistake has been made and quite frankly you should correct it,” Blitz told the committee members.
Rep. Carol Hall, R-Enfield, said the committee should make a formal request to the governor regarding whether funding is available for more testing.
Dave Altimari can be reached at daltimari@courant.com.
