The dashboard is updated at least four times a week as the College receives results for each of the four days of testing in a week and updates on numbers of current cases. The dashboard tracks both the volume of testing and the number of positive test results. The percentage of positive results and the number of active cases are two factors the College will track in order to determine the campus alert status and to make informed decisions about changes to campus operations. 

Updated on 01/16/2021, 10:00 AM EST

The Campus Alert Status and Response protocol uses a set of observable conditions to guide College decision making around health and safety measures for the campus and the community. The factors that will be considered in determining the alert level include but are not limited to:

• The number of positive cases on campus
• The number of students in quarantine
• Availability of testing
• Ability to deliver the academic program
• Ability to provide essential services
• Federal or state regulatory guidance
• Number of employee and student hospitalizations
• Local hospital capacity
• Resource availability/shortages (food, cleaning supplies, PPE)
• Unforeseen financial impacts

This is considered the College’s COVID-19 “normal” level. Here, the College is populated with students, faculty and staff and operating with baseline adjustments that address the existence of COVID-19. This baseline may evolve as the College becomes more accustomed to operating in a COVID-19 environment, or if the prevalence of COVID-19 changes on campus, in the region and in the state. Additional factors include the availability of a vaccine or effective treatment.

This alert level indicates that operations need to be modified, though the number of individuals testing positive for COVID-19 is still manageable and contract tracing suggests that exposures are confined to a small number of people. Effective contact tracing remains possible, and there is confidence in the ability to contain, isolate and remediate small clusters. Here, the campus continues to be populated with faculty, staff and students with adjustments to baseline operations in order to reduce density and in-person contacts.

This alert level indicates that on-campus operations must be reduced in response to a rising number of both positive tests and potential exposures. Isolation capacity is decreasing and confidence in the ability to complete contact tracing is moderate. As a result, parts of the College or the entire campus may need to shift into “cautionary quarantine” to limit movement on campus and minimize in-person contact. This alert level is the automatic status of the campus during on-boarding quarantine at the start of the semester. 

This alert level indicates the need for significantly reducing campus operations to a minimum, with students either operating in a remote learning format on-campus or transitioning to off-campus remote. The College shifts to this alert level when there is ongoing campus or community transmission occurring at an accelerating rate and there are limited strategies to contain or control the spread of COVID-19.