The Tufts Daily - Monday, March 15, 2021

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Monday, March 15, 2021

VOLUME LXXXI, ISSUE 24

Uncertainty around Tufts’ vaccination plans persists as Massachusetts continues through Phase 2 of vaccine rollout

by Sarah Sandlow Deputy News Editor

In a Feb. 18 email to the Tufts community, Michael Jordan, university infection control health director, explained Tufts’ plans to continue with Massachusetts’ vaccine rollout plan, which entered Phase 2, Group 2 that day. This group includes individuals 65 years and older, individuals with two or more qualifying medical conditions and those living or working in affordable senior housing.

However, the university did not have — and still does not have — vaccines to offer to those who fell into this group, meaning qualifying individuals have had to find other means to get vaccinated outside of Tufts. Now that Phase 3, which includes the majority of the student community and the general public, is approaching, uncertainty about how Tufts will distribute the vaccine persists.

Marie Caggiano, medical director of Health Service, told the Daily in an email that Tufts has received a very limited number of vaccines to distribute to the community. Massachusetts is currently prioritizing other distribution sites, such as regional vaccine sites and pharmacies, before it distributes supplies to colleges and universities.

“We have vaccinated a small number of individuals to date (approximately 100),” Caggiano said.

NICHOLAS PFOSI / THE TUFTS DAILY ARCHIVES

Tufts Medical Center is pictured on Aug. 28, 2014.

Those individuals, per the state’s guidelines, include health care workers, first responders and those who met the relevant state age requirements for each phase. First responders have also received their vaccines through the cities of Somerville and Worcester.

However, Caggiano said that if Tufts does receive vaccines in the future, it is prepared to administer them.

“We are continuing to plan for the potential of administering [the] vaccine once it becomes available to us in larger quantities,” Caggiano said.

Caggiano said that due to both the evolving nature of the state’s vaccination rollout and continued public health guidance, there is generally much uncertainty surrounding Tufts’ vaccination plans.

The Feb. 18 email emphasized that although Massachusetts

had moved into Phase 2, Group 2 of vaccinations, Tufts did not have vaccines available to host an on-campus clinic. Eligible members of the community were encouraged to find nearby pharmacies or mass vaccination sites. see VACCINES, page 2

Testing anomaly reported as Broad Institute introduces more sensitive testing

by Alexander Janoff Deputy News Editor

The Tufts Daily uncovered an anomaly in university reporting on the Daily’s COVID-19 dashboard when the number of new cases on the Medford/ Somerville campus declined by 20 and the number of new tests on the Medford/Somerville campus declined by 13 on Feb. 10. New case metrics for the dashboard are determined by subtracting the prior day’s cumulative number of unique

positive cases from the current day’s cumulative number of unique positive cases.

Since the cumulative number of unique positive cases should only ever increase, the Daily’s calculated new case metric should only ever be positive.

According to Michael Jordan, university infection control health director, and Chris Sedore, vice president for information technology and chief information officer, the anomaly occurred because the Broad Institute, the organization responsible for per-

forming COVID-19 surveillance testing for Tufts and many other schools in the region, launched a new version of the test it uses to detect COVID-19.

“This new version tests for two distinct genes of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, specifically, the N1 and N2 genes,” Jordan and Sedore wrote in an email to the Daily. “By looking at two regions of the virus, the new assay has increased sensitivity compared to prior versions which only tested for the N2 gene.”

An assay is an analytic procedure in lab sciences that is used

to determine the presence or amount of a target substance. The Broad Institute further explained its procedural development in a statement to the Daily.

“Late last month, the Broad testing center upgraded our high-scale testing to double our capacity and increase the robustness of our assay,” the statement said. “After two weeks’ worth of data from the upgrade, working with the MA Department of Public Health, we adjusted the interpretation thresholds that we use to call a test ‘positive.’”

Jordan and Sedore further explained the reason behind the Broad Institute’s change in test classifications. They said that a test must detect the presence of both the N1 and N2 genes to be deemed positive, an increase in criteria compared to the previous threshold, which required the presence of just one of the genes.

“Based on clinical and epidemiological data from case investigations, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (MPDH) in collaborasee TEST, page 2

GRAPHIC CREDIT: KAYLA DRAZAN, ASLI KOCAK, ANNABEL NIED

EDITORIAL / page 10

PHOTOS / page 6

GRAPHICS / page 7

Using what we’ve learned this year to promote change

Snapshots of the past year

March 2020 – March 2021 at Tufts

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THE TUFTS DAILY | News | Monday, March 15, 2021

THE TUFTS DAILY Megan Szostak Editor in Chief

— EDITORIAL — ETHAN STEINBERG Managing Editor

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Jordan says university is prepared to vaccinate hundreds of people per day, still awaiting vaccines VACCINES

continued from page 1 One such eligible member of Phase 2, Group 2, Maddie Yost, received her first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine on March 3 through CVS. Yost was eligible for the vaccine because she has postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome, a syndrome that affects the functioning of her autonomic nervous system.

“I woke up at 5 a.m. and went onto this website from CVS … and I went to Massachusetts first, thinking that I wasn’t going to be able to get it because I didn’t know if I qualified as a Massachusetts resident being from New Jersey, but I signed up, and it worked,” Yost, a sophomore, said.

Yost is scheduled to receive her second dose on March 31.

She said she was required to display a CVS Pharmacy insurance card to receive her vaccine, which she advised others to do if they are planning to

make a vaccination appointment through CVS. Yost said that with postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome, illnesses make her sicker than the average person. Because of this, she was very concerned about the possibility of contracting COVID-19. Her doctors told her that she would have to leave Tufts once the positivity rate on campus rose above 1% to reduce her risk of contracting the virus.

After the increase in cases on campus last fall, she returned home for Thanksgiving break and remained home for the rest of the semester, but is back this semester.

“There’s a sense of relief that I don’t have to be as scared,” Yost said. “I’m definitely going to still be very cautious because even though I won’t get super sick if I get COVID with the vaccine, I could carry it and pass it on to someone else. But I’m definitely very excited that things are getting better.”

Yost added that she has not yet communicated with Tufts about receiving the vaccine since she did not receive it through the university and was never contacted by Tufts about her eligibility. She plans to upload her vaccine information through the immunization portal once she receives her second dose.

Caggiano encouraged students to take advantage of local resources and consult with their local or state public health authorities to learn about vaccination rollout in the areas in which they live, as Yost did, since it is still uncertain when Tufts will receive vaccines.

“If eligible students have not received [the] vaccine before leaving Tufts’ campus this spring, they are encouraged to take advantage of local resources and receive immunization before returning to campus in the summer or fall,” Caggiano said. “The vaccine is not manda-

Broad Institute begins using more sensitive testing method TEST

continued from page 1 tion with The Broad Institute determined that the presence of one gene (N1 or N2 but not both) was not consistent with current infection in all cases, and thus results should be reported as [‘inconclusive’] accompanied by a recommendation for re-testing,” Jordan and Sedore said.

Marie Caggiano, medical director of Health Service, said that individuals who tested positive for one

gene under the new, more sensitive test were originally advised to begin isolation per typical procedure.

“Tufts University was notified of these positive results and contact[ed] individuals to advise them to begin isolation,” Caggiano wrote in an email to the Daily.

Due to this adjustment in threshold, however, several of these positive test results at Tufts were retroactively determined to be inconclusive.

“This affected a very small number of the 1 million results issued since the updated test was launched across the 200 sites the Broad supports,” Jordan and Sedore said.

Caggiano specified that the tests in question were initially deemed “invalid” before the Broad Institute finally determined that they should be classified as inconclusive.

“Corrected results for individuals who had received a positive

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tory for students, staff or faculty, although we strongly encourage our community members to be vaccinated.”

Jordan noted that Tufts is prepared to vaccinate hundreds of people per day once supplies become available to the university to do so. He said that the university would use the Gantcher Center as its vaccination site.

Caggiano underlined the importance of vaccination, emphasizing Jordan’s point.

“We can say that since the start of the pandemic, the university has been fully committed to the health and safety of its students, faculty, staff and community members,” Caggiano said. “In that spirit, our vaccination plan will prioritize health and safety, follow guidance from public health authorities, and be equitable in its treatment of the many constituencies within our community.”

NICOLE GARAY / THE TUFTS DAILY

The entrance to the Tufts COVID-19 testing center on the Medford/Somerville campus is pictured on Feb. 20.

result related to testing positive at only one gene targets were issued on 2/8/21,” Caggiano said.

“Initially, these re-classified results from the Broad were revised to ‘Invalid’ which was a [temporary designation] pending the update of … their system to include the new designation ‘Inconclusive.’”

Broad’s adjustment in testing strategy resulted in the total number of cumulative positive cases dropping, which was reflected on the Tufts COVID-19 Dashboard, from which the Daily gathers data for its dashboard.

According to Caggiano, this modification in testing strategy is the first of its kind since the testing program began at the beginning of the fall semester.

“This is the first change to the assay that has been made since the testing program went live in August and we do not anticipate additional changes on a frequent basis; however, as with all new scientific technology, the possibility to adapt exists as new data and knowledge emerge,” Caggiano said.

The Daily has since been able to report that there were actually four new cases on Feb. 10, calculating this metric from the seven-day total positive cases metric rather than the cumulative positive cases metric.

COVID-19 AT TUFTS

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Features

3 Monday, March 15, 2021

62R Talbot testing center staff keeps Tufts safe, engages with students

by Sam Russo

Outreach Coordinator

When Tufts students have birthdays these days, they don’t look forward to hosting a big party or trying a new restaurant or bar. Instead, they know that when they announce their birthday as they check in at the COVID-19 testing center at 62R Talbot Ave., they’ll be given a warm smile and a “happy birthday” from whoever is checking them in.

Just like masks, social distancing and Zoom, COVID-19 tests have become a routine part of life at Tufts amid the pandemic.

While these twice-weekly tests are usually a quick stop for students on their way to class or as they pick up food from a dining center, dozens of people have dedicated their professional lives to keep this system running for the past eight months. Here are some of the people working 11-and-a-half-hour shifts and currently overseeing roughly 1,700 tests each day to keep Tufts healthy, along with others who are tasked with constantly improving the system.

First, though, it would be helpful to understand some basics of the testing center: Tufts has a contract with Brewster Ambulance Service, one of the oldest private EMS services in New England. With both EMTs and non-certified support staffers, Brewster staffs the regular testing center at 62R, along with a special testing center at 51 Winthrop Street for those who have come in close contact with individuals who have tested positive. Brewster’s managerial team worked closely with Tufts to design the testing process, and Brewster is also helping Tufts navigate the all-important next phase of the pandemic: vaccine acquisition and distribution.

In addition to Tufts and Brewster, the third major partner in the testing process is the Broad Institute, which receives shipments of swabs three times a day and completes the actual lab work to test for the COVID-19 virus.

What’s in a day?

Work at 62R begins early in the day with setting up the site at 6:30 a.m. and continues until the center closes to students and faculty at 6 p.m. However, for Nicole Machado, one of the site leads, the day begins even earlier.

“I live in Rhode Island, so I get up at 3 a.m. I leave my house at 4:15. I have to be at our base in [Weymouth, Mass. at] 5:30 to pick up the vehicle and the rest of my team, then we drive to Tufts. We’re there for 11 hours, then we drive back to base and then from base, I still have to drive back to Rhode Island.” Machado said. “I don’t get home till 8:15 p.m. And I go right to sleep and do it again. I’ve been working about 70 to 80 hours every week since July or August.”

Despite the long hours, Machado says she loves her job.

She feels lucky to work alongside her daughter and cares deeply for members of her team, as well as the Tufts community. When she sits at the entrance to the testing center, checking students in, Machado is excited to speak with them and make new connections.

“I know a lot of [students] by face, and they come in and we talk like we’ve known each other for years. I have relationships with certain students that just know who I am [and] who my daughter is. Some brought us Christmas presents, which was totally unthinkable to me … It was great,” Machado said.

During the day, testing center staff also work in what they call “the bubble,” which is the room where students actually swab their noses. In the bubble, staff members take students’ samples.

Another aspect of working at the testing center, invisible to all but a small group of students, is checking in on the students who are in the modular residential units, or Mods, which Machado jokingly calls the “cootie cages.”

While the staff’s job is to make sure that students are healthy by checking their vital signs and assessing their symptoms, multiple staff members emphasized the importance of checking in on students’ mental health as well.

These EMTs and support staffers are quarantined students’ only in-person contact during their isolation, and they are very aware of this.

“I always make sure to tell the students, ‘Look, I know you’re quarantined, but just make sure you’re somehow keeping in touch with people, whether it’s FaceTime or texting or actually talking on the phone. Weather permitting, go outside, get some fresh air,’” Machado said. “I just tell them … ‘Your mental health is so important, and don’t feel like you’re just stuck in here by yourself. And you got to make the best of it.’”

When Machado says to make the best of it, she’s speaking from experience. In 2008, while working as an accountant at NBC TV in Rhode Island, she got into a car accident that left her needing two neck surgeries and still continues to cause her pain today.

In recovery from her surgeries, Machado realized she wasn’t satisfied with her professional life.

Machado eventually went back to school at 46 years old to earn her EMT certification.

“I graduated Feb. 1 of 2020. You have to take a national exam and pass it to be an EMT. I took that on Feb. 24, and I started working as an EMT on March 9. Hello, Corona!” she said with a laugh.

Despite starting amid a global crisis, Machado seems delighted with her new line of work.

“I just love everything. I love working with people. I love helping them. I love, just — I don’t know — work,” she said.“So it’s never the same thing. It’s never boring. Every day is something different. And yeah, I just absolutely love it. I wish I had known.”

International adventurer: Rob Barss Rob Barss, another site lead at 62R Talbot, is the sort of person you might expect to find in the booth of a saloon in an old-fashioned movie regaling the locals with his stories. He bounces happily between tales of his adventures traveling the world in his youth (“I went all the way around the world for $2,200 once”) and his plans for the future. Despite his focus on what’s to come, he’s completely dedicated to his work at Tufts at present.

“My degree is in international relations, and I was always going to work for a non-governmental organization,” Barss said.

However, after getting married and settling down, Barss found himself working at a plant nursery. Barss has a passion for plants and gardening; every summer he enjoys turning his yard into a tropical paradise, but he had the desire to do more humanitarian work. When Barss turned 50,

SAM RUSSO / THE TUFTS DAILY

Rob Barss, a site lead at the 62R Talbot testing center, is pictured.

he began looking to gain professional experience that would allow him to work with Doctors Without Borders or Mercy Corps in his retirement. Working as an EMT — especially during a pandemic — he hopes to gain the skills he needs to help others around the world.

Barss’ desire to work abroad is rooted in a sense of adventure that he’s had for years.

“I spent a great part of my 20s and 30s with a backpack and

Students helping students Of course, not everyone working at 62R changed their career mid-life like Barss or Machado. Some, such as Tufts junior Melissa Barbosa or Boston University senior Sarah Horn, are pre-med students working at the testing center to explore careers in medicine. Partially because they’re not in oversight roles like Barss and Machado, Barbosa and Horn’s days can end up a little slow at times.

COURTESY SARAH HORN

Sarah Horn, a Boston University senior who works at the testing center, is pictured. a plane ticket or a train ticket. I have passports stapled under passports. I would just go. I saw pictures of the Steppe of Mongolia. I’m like, ‘I want to throw a frisbee [there],’ so I hopped on a plane and a train and went to Mongolia to throw frisbees,” he said.

Barss said he prioritizes the human aspect of travel, preferring to spend time in smaller villages and getting to know the locals rather than visiting flashy tourist destinations. At 62R, he carries that same interest in connecting with people, and really tries to engage with the students he interacts with.

“I’ve gotten to know [the students], joke with them and have fun with them,” Barss said. “I remember this one snowstorm [when] a whole bunch of guys that I recognized … [were] coming in. It was snowing, it was muddy, it was horrible. I’m like, ‘Guys! Take your shoes off.’ And they all stopped and were like ‘Oh my God!’ and I said ‘I’m kidding! I’m kidding … I’m glad to see you were brought up correctly, but I’m just kidding.’ We’ll have fun with them. They know me, I know them.”

When Barss speaks about Tufts students, he seems genuinely filled with joy. After his interview with the Daily, Barss reached out again, worried that he had forgotten an important point. That point? How much he appreciates the effort of each student to keep campus safe during the pandemic.

Sometimes, this means that they’ll get some extra time to do schoolwork, but it can also mean that they have to go through the same tedious motions with dozens of students.

“It’s a lot of the same conversations over and over again: ‘Hey, how are you? What’s your birthday?’” Horn said. “What really helps is that some students are just so outgoing and so friendly.”

Horn tries to engage quieter students with talk about their birthdays and astrology.

“Someone will be born on July 17, and I’ll say, ‘That’s the emoji birthday,’” she said, referencing the calendar emoji, which shows the date July 17. “I just said that to one kid, and he [said], ‘Wait, are you telling me they don’t personalize emojis for everyone’s birthday?’ I had to break that news to him, and that was funny.”

Asking for birthdays, of course, is one of the biggest parts of testing staff’s interaction with students. Barbosa said some staff members are hoping to set up a birthday bingo game to make the day more entertaining. The idea is that every time an employee checks a student in, they can check that student’s birthday off the bingo card, and whoever finished their card first gets a prize.

For Barbosa, one of the unique benefits of working in the testing center is getting to see people she knows. In a time when there’s no running into someone in the dining hall or see CENTER , page 4

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THE TUFTS DAILY | Features | Monday, March 15, 2021

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Testing center staff discuss daily challenges, teamwork CENTER

continued from page 3 finding yourself on serendipitous social outings with friends of friends, Barbosa feels lucky to work at 62R. “It’s just been nice to see people in passing that I haven’t really been able to hang out with on a personal basis,” she said.

In addition to people she knew prior to the pandemic, Barbosa has also gotten to know new faces through her work at the testing center. As she sees all of these faces streaming through the testing center, Barbosa thinks it’s important for everyone to remember the human side of the interaction.

“We’re real people behind our mask,” she said. “We’ve been there all day, and we’re there for the students, so it’s nice when people ask us, ‘How’s your day going?’ or when we make little jokes about people’s birthdays. That’s what we talk about all day, and it’s just nice to have those short conversations with other people.”

Challenges and innovations In addition to the potential for boredom, the staff and oversight team at 62R have faced other challenges over the past two semesters.

The tissues outside the testing center, for example, are an almost constant source of annoyance.

“One of the main things I do here is keep on putting tissues out. Tissues, tissues, tissues are the bane of my existence,” Barss joked.

According to Barss, students are asked to blow their noses before getting tested because the viral particles tend to linger deeper in the nose than the swap reaches.

Blowing your nose before getting tested

brings those particles closer to the swab and improves the test’s accuracy.

Of course, the management teams from Tufts and Brewster also have to deal with serious logistical concerns, which students may not always consider. For example, Julian Rosenwolf, operations coordinator for Tufts Conference and Events Services, described problems with the interior of the 62R Talbot testing center.

“I know that the carpet has been destroyed, and we had to figure out a way to change the carpet, while not disturbing all the testing … it’s still an issue,” he said.

“We’re going to either have to do it off hours when the center is not open, or we’ll have to change the setup, or we’ll have to figure out a way,” he said.

From a clinical standpoint, another issue is tests coming back with inconclusive results. For example, there can sometimes be too much material on the nose swabs.

“Some of the students are very, very generous with their donations,” Barss said.

Having too little material or getting blood on the swab can also cause problems. While sometimes the staff at the testing center can spot this when the vials are handed to them, issues with swabs are often difficult to detect.

Because of this, Barss said Tufts students have been working with the university to develop machines that can look at the samples and verify that they will be viable before they’re sent to the Broad Institute’s labs. While the device is still in its early stages, he’s hopeful it will help make the testing experience even smoother.

Finally, one of the initial hurdles at the start of the testing process was how students would be able to move quickly

through the testing center. In response, Chris Sedore, Tufts’ chief information officer, thought of the system, now well known to students and faculty, where individuals tap their IDs to print out a label.

Brewster’s Director of Operations Domenic “Dom” Corey said that without the ID system, students would have to check in through a much more time consuming manual process. “[The ID system] is the single most important factor that revolutionized the flow through [the testing center],” Corey said. “[Without this system], you can triple the time it takes every single person that goes through there … [Students’] experience would be significantly more burdensome, and testing compliance rates would be lower.”

Appreciation for each other It is the strong collaboration between everyone from Tufts’ leadership and the Brewster Ambulance Service to the individual shift leads and staffers that keeps the testing

center running smoothly. All employees showed a great appreciation for the work of their colleagues and recognized the importance of every individual role in maintaining a positive and efficient environment in the testing center.

“The folks that you see day in day out … our crew is absolutely incredible,” Corey said. “We all love working with each other … [Tufts has] an incredible administrative team and leadership team that really cares about doing a good job and providing the best possible experience for the community. I can honestly say that with pride, I love working with them … It really sets Tufts apart.”

In a year marred by tragedies and challenges, the Tufts/Brewster testing team is full of passion and kindness.

They’re excited to help others and make everyone’s day just a little bit better. As the university continues to navigate the pandemic, their positivity and appreciation for each other can be models for each of us.

Q&A: Dr. Michael Jordan discusses Tufts’ COVID-19 response

by Owen Bonk

Assistant Features Editor

Editor’s note: This interview has been edited for clarity.

Dr. Michael Jordan was appointed as the university’s infection control health director in August 2020. In this position, Jordan has spearheaded the university’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, overseeing testing, vaccination and contact tracing programs. Jordan is also an attending physician in the Division of Infectious Diseases and Geographic Medicine at Tufts Medical Center and an assistant professor at Tufts University School of Medicine. His expertise centers around HIV and emerging diseases like COVID-19. The Daily interviewed Jordan over email to discuss his role in Tufts’ COVID-19 response.

The Tufts Daily: We’re about to mark the first anniversary of the COVID-19 pandemic. Last March, what did you make of COVID-19?

Michael Jordan: Unfortunately, as an infectious disease physician and virologist, I feared the worst and sadly it has come true. We are living through a century defining event.

TD: Did you think the university would be capable of resuming operations amid a pandemic?

MJ: Yes, I knew it was possible with surveillance testing and protocols to mitigate transmission combined with the tremendous dedication of students, faculty and staff.

TD: From your own observations, how well have the students dealt with the adjustments in campus life under COVID-19?

MJ: Tufts students have shown commendable resilience and strength in the face of a life-defining pandemic. I am tremendously proud of each and every student as I know how hard it has been.

TD: In general, how successful has Tufts’ vaccine rollout been? So far, has it progressed as you hoped it would?

MJ: We are prepared to vaccinate many hundreds of people per day. However, the state has opted, due to limited supply of vaccines, to provide vaccines at large vaccination sites. All individuals classified as Phase 1 at Tufts have been offered vacci-

nation. Our set up in the Gantcher Center is second to none and we have our experts at event management, Tufts Technology Services and emergency management to thank for that. Should the state provide us with more vaccines, we stand ready to vaccinate Tufts students, faculty and staff and to serve our local communities, if asked.

TD: Going forward, what about our current status makes you feel optimistic?

MJ: Vaccination is the light at the end of the tunnel. However, let us not let our guard down too soon. Over 500,000 Americans have died — a terrible toll — so let us remain vigilant until nearly everyone has been vaccinated.

TD: What makes you feel pessimistic?

MJ: I am concerned about the possibility of variants that will evade vaccine-generated immunity.

TD: Are there ways in which, even after a sufficient amount of the population is vaccinated, the pandemic will continue to affect our lives?

MJ: So many of us have lost loved ones; these are scars we will bear forever.

TD: What do you predict will be the more lasting effects on university/national policy?

MJ: I hope that University life will return to its pre-pandemic normal. I hope that the US government and international organizations finally take seriously the threat of emerging infectious disease and pandemic response.

COURTESY PATRICK COLLINS

Dr. Michael Jordan, Tufts University infection control health director, is pictured.

Arts & POP ARTS Pop CULTURE Culture

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On-campus arts students, professors respond to COVID-19 with resilience

by Tuna Margalit, Maeve Hagerty and Phoebe Wong Executive Arts Editor and Assistant Arts Editors

Disclaimer: Ben Leikind is a contributing writer at The Tufts Daily. He was not involved in the writing or editing of this article.

It’s been just over a year since COVID-19 shut down Tufts University. Amid the initial pandemic panic, educators and students were forced to quickly adapt to a virtual environment — something especially difficult for the university’s arts groups and programs.

The Daily had the chance to speak with multiple professors and students involved in the arts about the transition to online formats.

Film and media studies From the film and media studies program, senior Emai Lai and Professor Malcolm Turvey, director of the FMS program, shared their thoughts on the past year and the coming ones. Turvey first reflected on the day that in-person classes were suspended.

“First of all, I was pretty sure we were going to be remote for the rest of the semester. Second of all, we were all just trying to work out how to navigate to fully remote instruction,” Turvey said. “I was talking with the faculty of film and media studies about how we were going to do that … that was probably the number one concern, given that few of us had done any significant remote teaching before. So that was foremost in my mind — how do you teach effectively online?”

Turvey spoke to the influence that class size has in providing an engaging virtual experience.

“I was fortunate to be teaching a seminar. For those kinds of classes, I think we felt it was easier. Larger lecture classes were harder in terms of keeping people engaged,” he said. “Faculty had to [get] up to speed on the technology [and] ensure that students remain engaged in the course. [The] toughest [were] the filmmaking courses, which are hands-on.”

Lai echoed these sentiments, discussing how she is fortunate enough to work on a small set for her senior thesis course project.

While many students in senior thesis classes typically work on “production projects,” Lai said, she is the only one in her class to do so this year. She made a short film — with a small cast and crew — and collected footage over winter break.

“There was a lot of discussing with my professors [and] COVID safety officers about what was possible to have on set,” she said.

Her crew was comprised of four people; her cast — just two.

“We all wore so many different hats on set,” she said.

Both Lai and Turvey believe the FMS program will return stronger than it was pre-pandemic. Lai focused on the film creation part.

“On the production side of things, I can imagine people being

NICOLE GARAY, ANN MARIE BURKE AND SEOHYUN SHIM / THE TUFTS DAILY

Barnum Hall (left), home of the film and media studies program, Granoff Music Center (middle) and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University (right) are pictured. extra excited to be able to write and create their own films, and plan scenes in more exciting locations,” Lai said. “I think people overall will be pretty excited to have the doors open in terms of what kind of stories they can write.”

Turvey highlighted the 2019 reopening of Barnum Hall, which houses the FMS program, after a year-long renovation. The program was given its own section within the building, which included filmmaking studios and an editing lab.

“We were just starting to work out how we were going to use all of this … when the pandemic hit,” Turvery said. “We have all of this untapped possibility that, once we’re all back in person again, we’ll be able to take advantage of.”

Student groups Since the onset of the pandemic, music and live performance have suffered on the Tufts campus.

With the advent of the Tufts policy that forbids singing and the playing of brass and wind instruments on campus, student musical groups have had to improvise and find new methods of performance.

Sophomore Ben Leikind is president of the Tufts street percussion ensemble Bangin’ Everything At Tufts. He said that one of the most difficult aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic for the music group has been the loss of in-person performances, especially their end-of-semester concert at Dewick-MacPhie Dining Center.

Due to Tufts’ initial restrictions on in-person meetings for student groups, Leikind said that BEATs was unable to hold auditions this year because “all [their] songs are original: there is no database where the parts are kept.” Because of that, it would be too difficult to virtually teach the parts to new members.

Leikind clarified that the songwriting process for BEATs is “a very interactive creation process.”

Additionally, he mentioned that because of this inability to teach musical parts in person, a few of the group’s classic pieces may need to be retired. While acknowledging this loss, Leikind still feels hopeful for the future and the “new creative opportunities” that the retirement

of some of their past songs will open for future instrumentalists.

Sophomore Liliko Uchida described similar issues that Tufts’ all female-identifying a cappella group, the Jackson Jills, have faced. A member of the Jills, Uchida said that she was initially worried about how the group would continue producing music, since their members are scattered across the globe. However, she found that she enjoyed recording some of the songs virtually, from her own home. As a result of Tufts’ policy regarding on-campus singing, the group has been unable to rehearse or perform in person this year. Uchida clarified, however, that her experience over the past year has not been entirely negative.

For example, the Jills started a new buddy system to help include its new members.

Uchida said the buddy system “motivates [members] to get to know the new kids in the group and have an incentive to hang out with people,” which has been a struggle for many during the pandemic. Similar to Leikind, Uchida is devastated by the inability to perform in person, but she believes that after restrictions are eased, “the appreciation for those live performances and rehearsals will increase a lot.”

Despite a disappointing year for musical performance at Tufts, many students like Uchida and Leikind were able to find ways to keep their musical groups alive while planning for the future and engaging in virtual performances. This display of resilience, dedication and ingenuity is a comforting indicator that Tufts’ musical groups will continue to survive and thrive through whatever conflicts await them, and hopefully will find themselves performing in some capacity for live audiences very soon.

The School of the Museum of Fine Arts Learning remotely is uniquely difficult for art students due to art’s highly interactive and involved process, yet the School

of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts and its students have responded to the pandemic with incredible resilience over the past year. Students often thrive with personal feedback and require the right space, materials and hands-on training to do their work. With all SMFA classes being virtual this year, fourth-year Tufts-SMFA combined-degree student Delilah Roberts reflected on her experience.

“The naturalness of being in the studio and seeing what everybody else is doing is gone,” she said. “You really make a connection with the professor if they see your work in person.”

Beyond classes themselves, access to studios and materials has been limited. Studio space can be reserved this year, but some students like Roberts usually “jump around between studios and like [to] use many things at a time.”

Working in high hazard studios where tools require significant safety training is even more difficult. According to welding studio manager Adam “Legs” Cowell, the studio “can’t safely give any new trainings because it takes hours and hours … everyone has to be up close.” Just as some students may feel detached from the creation process, Legs misses interacting with students and seeing the progression of their work. “I feel left out,” he said.

Despite this, the SMFA has put massive efforts into innovative solutions. For instance, when students need a specific piece from more intensive shops, they can describe the piece and request the shop to make it for them. Additionally, the SMFA tried shipping huge packages of materials and tools to students during the spring 2020 semester.

Although this first approach was unsuccessful, the school transitioned during this academic year to giving SMFA students extra Rhino Bucks, the SMFA equivalent of JumboCash, to spend on supplies.

In addition to administrative perseverance through trial and error, students adapted in creative ways. Roberts responded to having fewer new materials at her disposal by “digging through [her] closets” and recycling old clothing, even using packaging boxes for art projects. In fact, she is currently sewing lingerie out of an old shower curtain.

She notes that in addition to creative solutions, the pandemic has also pushed her to be more sustainable.

Legs echoed her sentiment with praise, saying that, to be a successful artist, “you need to be resourceful and resilient.” He explained that, because of the pandemic, artists have to “get [their] brilliant idea across with minimal inputs.”

And yet, despite the disappointment shared by Roberts and her peers at the anniversary of all these changes, Roberts said, “I feel like I’m in the eye of a hurricane … It’s so messed up, the present moment, that I just want to think about the future. And that’s my way of coping with it.”

The pandemic has undoubtedly been challenging, but it’s also given her time to reflect on her future goals and put more time into her art.

Roberts also recognizes the pandemic’s challenges for younger students still finding their niche. However, as an experienced artist she feels COVID-19 has accelerated her artistic growth and allowed for greater resilience in the SMFA culture as a whole. Legs already “feel[s] the energy picking up in the building” again from his position in the welding studio. Students are starting to install their senior thesis projects early this year, which he thinks is the time when “everything kind of coalesces into something awesome,” calling it “inspiring.”

SMFA students and faculty have had to do their fair share of scrambling this year, but it’s fair to say that their efforts have culminated in something amazing.

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THE TUFTS DAILY | PHOTOS | Monday, March 15, 2021

tuftsdaily.com

In Photos: Tufts in the pandemic

COURTESY SUSAN WANG

A London street is pictured by Tufts senior Susan Wang. Due to the pandemic, Wang was stranded in England while studying abroad last spring.

SARAH GOLDSTEIN / THE TUFTS DAILY

Students conduct a lab remotely for Intro to Engineering: Engineering in Crises on Nov. 9, 2020.

NICOLE GARAY / THE TUFTS DAILY

Students quickly pack up after being notified that they must leave their dorms over the weekend on March 12, 2020.

SARAH GOLDSTEIN / THE TUFTS DAILY

Shabbat-to-go bags are distributed to students at the Chabad House on Sept. 4, 2020.

A student scans in at Dewick-MacPhie Dining Center to pick up food.

A view of the Mods from Blakeley Hall is pictured on Feb. 20.

SARAH GOLDSTEIN / THE TUFTS DAILY

SOPHIE DOLAN / THE TUFTS DAILY

SARAH GOLDSTEIN / THE TUFTS DAILY

Students use Boomwhackers in lieu of wind instruments during Wind Ensemble on Oct. 7, 2020.

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Monday, March 15, 2021 | GRAPHICS | THE TUFTS DAILY

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A year of COVID-19 Tufts responds to the pandemic

March 12, 2020

Tufts student tests positive for COVID-19 The first Tufts affiliate who tested positive for COVID-19 was a student who may have contracted the virus from a high school reunion in the United Kingdom that saw alumni from various European countries. Following their return, the student attended an on-campus party and two classes before presenting with symptoms and going to Health Service, where they tested positive for COVID-19.

March 17, 2020

Tufts students abroad struggle to get home as world’s borders close As of March 17, at least five Tufts students who were participating in School for International Training and Butler University’s Institute for Study Abroad were stuck abroad in Morocco and Peru due to international flight suspension and closed borders.

June 23, 2020

Tufts announces plans for fall semester, will invite students back to campus In a guide released by the university in late June, Tufts announced it would be inviting students back to campus for the fall 2020 semester, amid changes in residential, travel and lifestyle practices. The administration also presented students with the options of participating in the semester remotely or taking the semester off if they did not want to return to in-person learning.

October 2, 2020

Tufts announces new Thanksgiving policy, will not allow students who travel for the break to return Tufts announced specific guidelines for the Thanksgiving holiday break and said that students who planned to leave campus for the holiday must remain at home until after winter break. Those students were asked to finish the semester remotely, while students who did not leave campus for the break were able to finish the semester on campus.

November 15, 2020

Tufts tightens COVID-19 restrictions on students studying in person Due to an uptick in COVID-19 cases, Tufts imposed stricter guidelines. The university said students should remain in their residence halls or off-campus apartments unless they were attending classes, getting a COVID-19 test, seeking medical care, going to or from jobs, getting food or exercising outdoors. The guidelines also stated that the gym would close for recreational purposes.

February 24, 2021

Tufts lifts some COVID-19 restrictions, others remain in place Tufts relaxed certain COVID-19 restrictions as the number of cases declined on Tufts campuses and in Massachusetts in general since arrival quarantine in late January.

The relaxed guidelines included reopening the fitness center, allowing in-person reservations at Carmichael Dining Center and Dewick-MacPhie Dining Center and lifting Massachusetts’ overnight stay-at-home order. The residential campus status level remained at “Yellow Plus.”

March 14, 2020

Students asked to move out of residence halls by Monday, extensions possible Tufts students on the Medford/Somerville and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts campuses were asked to move out of their residence halls by March 16. Students had the opportunity to apply for housing extensions in certain cases, with petitions considered by the Dean of Student Affairs Office and Office of Residential Life and Learning. The university noted that residents halls would be cleaned and sanitized once students had moved out.

May 18, 2020

Tufts receives $4.7 million from CARES Act, $2.3 million to go to emergency financial aid The Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act, which was signed into law on March 27, allocated around $2 trillion to aid individuals and businesses. Tufts received $4.7 million through the CARES Act, with at least $2.3 million going toward emergency financial aid grants for students.

The other $2.4 million could be spent at Tufts’ discretion, and as of May, the plan for at least some of that money was to cover costs associated with pandemic changes, like the transition to online learning.

September 25, 2020

Tufts Dining workers strained by COVID-19 impact, understaffed

Amid new COVID-19 protocols and a new ordering system, Tufts Dining workers said there was a major staff shortage and that they felt overworked and overtired. University officials pledged to fill the staffing gaps, though workers spoke of staff taking on responsibilities outside the realm of their jobs.

October 9, 2020

Spring semester to begin Feb. 1, spring break to be shortened The spring semester was set to begin on Feb. 1, a decision that was approved after a faculty senate vote. The dates for final exams and Review Boards for the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, as well as the dates for Senior Week and Commencement, remained the same. This decision was reached to allow for a longer winter break, providing more time for deep cleaning and ensuring students move back to campus in a staggered fashion.

February 1, 2021

Tufts begins Phase 1 vaccinations for health care workers, first responders Tufts began vaccinating members of the community in Phase 1 of the Massachusetts COVID-19 vaccine distribution plan on Jan. 6. Most of these members, including patient-facing medical and dental students, faculty and staff; patient-facing occupational therapy students; Health Service staff; Counseling and Mental Health Services staff and COVID-19 surveillance testing support staff, were vaccinated at Tufts Medical Center.

REPORTING: MADDIE AITKEN, EXECUTIVE NEWS EDITOR. PHOTO CREDIT (FROM LEFT TO RIGHT, TOP TO BOTTOM): MEGAN SZOSTAK / THE TUFTS DAILY, ANN MARIE BURKE / THE TUFTS DAILY, ANN MARIE BURKE / THE TUFTS DAILY, LYDIA RICHARDSON / THE TUFTS DAILY, ALONSO NICHOLS / TUFTS UNIVERSITY AND ANN MARIE BURKE / THE TUFTS DAILY. GRAPHIC CREDIT: ALIZA KIBEL / THE TUFTS DAILY, JACKIE MCCARTHY / THE TUFTS DAILY AND CAMILLA SAMUEL / THE TUFTS DAILY

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THE TUFTS DAILY | Arts & Pop Culture | Monday, March 15, 2021

Derin Savasan Hot Take

‘Saturday Night Live’ isn’t funny anymore

I

’m a big-time procrastinator, which means I always find something to help me avoid doing work. And for the longest time, that “thing” has been watching “Saturday Night Live” (1975–) clips on YouTube one after another — for hours. Lately, however, I have found myself seeking other sources of entertainment because SNL is no longer funny.

Now, I’d love to get into the history of SNL and talk about some of its legendary cast members from past decades.

People like Eddie Murphy, Will Ferrell, Phil Hartman, John Belushi, Gilda Radner, Dan Aykroyd and Dana Carvey were genuinely funny. They all found clever ways to entertain their audience without having to rely on the socio-political context of their time.

Sure, they made occasional skits on Ronald Reagan, but not all the punchlines were political. Most of them were funny because their depiction of Reagan and the delivery of the jokes were funny. Whereas, nowadays, it’s almost impossible to laugh at an SNL skit without being familiar with current political events. The sketches are either based on Joe Biden calling Donald Trump “a clown” or Bernie Sanders wearing memorable mittens at Biden’s inauguration. There are no punchlines there.

These things are funny on their own — that is, if you watched the 2020 U.S. presidential debates or Biden’s inauguration.

But I’m not going to talk more about the golden age of SNL. I wasn’t born until 2002, so it’s not my area of knowledge.

What I can do is talk about SNL’s “silver age,” led by people like Bill Hader, Fred Armisen, Rachel Dratch, Kristen Wiig, Jason Sudeikis and Andy Samberg in the late 2000s and early 2010s.

Take the digital short “The Shooting” (2007), also known as “Dear Sister,” as an example. It’s a loose homage to the final moment of the Season 2 finale of “The O.C.” (2003–07), when two of the main characters shoot each other in a dramatic crossfire as Imogen Heap’s “Hide and Seek” (2005) plays in the background.

We start off with Bill Hader talking to Andy Samberg about a letter Hader wrote to his sister, played by Kristen Wiig. While reading his letter out loud, Hader gets shot by Samberg out of the blue and falls onto the ground. Unexpectedly, he shoots Samberg, who then shoots him again as they both lie on the ground. Then comes Shia LaBeouf into the room, who gets shot by both Hader and Samberg for no reason.

As they all lay on the ground and shoot each other to their deaths, Kristen Wiig arrives at the scene, shocked by this sight.

She picks up the letter that Hader wrote to her but gets shot immediately by Hader, Samberg and LaBeouf.

The funniest part is that every time someone gets caught in the crossfire, “Hide and Seek” starts playing, making the sketch impossible not to laugh at. It’s the absurdity and repetition that make this SNL sketch hilarious and unforgettable.

Now, I’m not saying SNL is no longer relevant. But they should make more sketches like “Dear Sister” if they want to stay relevant. Because their current formula isn’t working — at least, not for me.

Derin Savasan is a first-year who has not yet declared a major. Derin can be reached at derin.savasan@tufts.edu.

tuftsdaily.com

COVID-19 has affected the arts, locally and globally

by Devina Bhalla, Stephanie Hoechst, Chris Panella, Yas Salon, Drew Weisberg, Sadie Leite and Phoebe Wong Arts Editors and Assistant Arts Editors

Movies COVID-19’s impact on the film industry has been well-publicized and well-debated. Across the country, most movie theaters closed during the various stages of lockdowns, and plenty of films’ productions and releases were delayed.

Thankfully, many movies finished production, like Christopher McQuarrie’s “Mission: Impossible 7” (2021) and Olivia Wilde’s “Don’t Worry Darling,” which is expected to be released in 2021. While some studios are holding off releases of their films for movie theaters, like Marvel’s “Black Widow” (2021), others made difficult decisions to release their content on streaming services. Warner Bros. in particular faced controversy when it announced that all of its 2021 films would be released in theaters and on its associated streaming service HBO Max simultaneously. This includes blockbusters like “Dune” (2021), “Space Jam: A New Legacy” (2021) and “The Suicide Squad” (2021). This decision certainly reflects our use of steaming services over this past year. But only time — and our COVID-19 vaccine distribution — will tell when audiences will return to movie theaters.

TV With movie theaters becoming an issue during the pandemic, TV became a comfort for many of us watching at home.

Since the pandemic, it seems that every channel has launched its own streaming service — where there used to be Netflix, Hulu and Amazon Prime Video, there’s now HBO Max, NBC’s Peacock, Paramount+, Discovery+, AppleTV+ and Disney+ launching either just before or during the pandemic. With so much content available through streaming, it begs the question of how cable will fare in the coming years. As for content, we obviously can’t forget the incredible second lives of “Avatar: The Last Airbender” (2005–08) and “The Legend of Korra” (2012–14) had after being added to Netflix. As for new shows, it seems productions companies are still able to release quite a bit of new content for all of us cooped up at home —”The Queen’s Gambit” (2020), Season 4 of “The Crown” (2016–), “The Flight Attendant” (2020–), “Ted Lasso” (2020–), “The Undoing” (2020) and Season 4 of “Big Mouth” (2017–) all dropped on streaming platforms during the pandemic, showing that despite all the difficulties of in-person production, TV and especially streaming are still going strong.

Music The biggest change the music industry saw following the onset of COVID-19 was the end of live music. Several large artists were forced to cancel or postpone tours, including Doja Cat, Dua Lipa, Lady Gaga and BTS. A halt in live music gave rise to livestreaming as the primary medium through which fans could see their favorite artists perform. While livestreams lack the immersive quality of actually standing in a venue, the format allows for greater artistic control than an in-person show does. In October, Billie Eilish used 3D graphics to create haunting visuals of spiders towering over her, as well as placing herself in an ocean scene, surrounded by sharks. Grammy-nominated artist Phoebe Bridgers similarly used green-screen graphics in an August livestream, presenting herself and her band in front of the cosmos. While live shows are certainly no stranger to grand visual displays, the sheer amount of control that artists and their

MADELEINE OLIVER / THE TUFTS DAILY

The Somerville Theatre in Davis Square is pictured on Sept. 25, 2018. collaborators exerted over the images they presented to viewers is unparalleled.

While larger artists have stayed afloat during the pandemic, beloved venues have felt the impact of the end of live shows. In Boston, multiple local venues have been forced to close doors due to economic losses following the cancellation and postponement of live music. Among such venues is Great Scott, which has hosted shows in the greater Boston area for more than 40 years. ONCE Somerville was also forced to close doors in November. Luckily for the former, crowdfunding may allow the venue to reopen.

Fashion The pandemic shook the fashion industry like never before. As people began dressing more casually for home and shopping in stores less, some questioned if fashion as we know it would collapse into a “sweatpants 24/7” lifestyle. The industry itself was one of the hardest hit by COVID19, with huge revenue losses, fractured global supply chains and production temporarily brought to a standstill. Factory workers already facing poor conditions faced huge layoffs, or alternatively were overworked and exposed to outbreaks.

Despite all the doom and gloom, many designers responded resiliently, and some fashion weeks adapted to virtual formats surprisingly well. Some even believe the challenges posed by COVID-19 provide an opportunity to transform fashion to embrace greater body positivity, diversity, environmentalism and ethical working conditions. While it’s unclear whether the pandemic will leave fashion worse or better off than before, there’s no denying it’s been an eventful year that will change the business forever.

Books COVID-19 has had a mixed effect on the book industry, contributing to the increase of sales in books, but also impairing the business of many independent bookstores. According to Publishers Weekly magazine, in the wake of the pandemic, “combined print book and e-book sales hit 942 million units in 2020 at outlets that report to NPD BookScan, a 9% increase over 2019.” This increase can be attributed to the convenience of online shopping in the pandemic.

Independent bookstores faced a different outcome with the pandemic, struggling in the face of restrictions and specifically during the holidays. Porter Square Books in Cambridge relies on the holiday season to bring in one third of its yearly book sales. Confronted with the reality of inevitably lower sales due to COVID19 restrictions, stores adapted. The shift to internet platforms, whether for virtual events or selling books online, was a significant adjustment.

On top of this, Harvard Bookstore sent a letter to customers that outlined recent struggles and urged early shopping, capitalizing on community support to make it through. Brookline Booksmith successfully expanded its store, partnering with Curds & Co. to excite deterred customers with a new restaurant and bookstore combination. Another company, Bookshop, which supports local bookstores, prospered amid the pandemic. Bookshop aims to combat Amazon’s monopoly on the online book market by sending some of its profit to independent bookstores.

Reflecting on a year of COVID-19 restrictions, the book industry adapted with innovative solutions. Still, support is necessary for independent bookstores to combat booming online monopolies and quell the constant uncertainty of this age.

Comics Despite some egregious incidents, it has been amazing to watch comic books soldier on through the pandemic. With new digital series announced with bigname talent to new events bringing in new readers, comics are seeing a sort of rebirth as they adapt to the new challenges. Even the local Davis Square comic book store, Comicazi, is open for business, all while respecting capacity limits and adhering to the mask mandate. It’s a world of comfort for me, and I’m sure other comic enthusiasts, to be able to safely wander the aisles and appreciate the new releases. Titles like DC Comics’ “Future State” (2021–), its ever-expanding “Black Label” line and Jonathan Hickman’s X-men titles were all released unhindered and right there for purchase. The comic book scene, at least around the Medford/Somerville area, is alive and well.

Video Games When physical production became a huge risk, entertainment industries like film and TV took an unplanned hiatus.

Fortunately, video games, which provide countless hours of play, are thriving, even though development pipelines have lengthened due to work-from-home setups. Hits since the March 2020 lockdown include Nintendo’s “Animal Crossing: New Horizons” (2020), Naughty Dog’s “The Last of Us Part II” (2020), Sucker Punch’s “Ghost of Tsushima” (2020), Supergiant’s “Hades” (2020) and, as we can all probably remember, Innersloth’s wildly popular “AmongUs,” which was initially released in 2018 but dropped a Switch version in 2020. Despite the long-awaited flop of the CD Projekt Red game “Cyberpunk 2077” (2020), the output for video games has continued to keep players engaged with brand new stories, escapist worlds and spaces for socializing with friends (as anyone who’s visited a friend’s island in “Animal Crossing” can corroborate).

Monday, March 15, 2021 | FUN & GAMES | THE TUFTS DAILY

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LATE NIGHT AT THE DAILY Elizabeth: “Wait, so this isn’t the Michael Jordan that plays basketball?”

FUN & GAMES

SUDOKU

LEGENDARY FEATS OF STRENGTH

Difficulty Level: Writing an entire six-page essay in one night

By Matthew Hixson

Friday’s Solutions

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10 Monday, March 15, 2021

Opinion

tuftsdaily.com

EDITORIAL

Lessons from a year of crisis This week marks one year since the COVID-19 pandemic forced students to leave Tufts’ campus last spring. A year with no in-person graduation, a year with no in-person pre-orientation, a year that changed the way we dine, a year that changed the way we go to class, a year that changed the way we connect with the people we care about. And with every day that goes by, it seems less likely that we will ever “return to normal” — any post-pandemic world will be radically different than the one we left behind a year ago. So as we reflect on all that we’ve lost in the past year, we should also take a moment to think about what kind of new “normal” we want to create for the years ahead.

As students, we must respond to times of crisis with compassion in the way we treat others — and ourselves. Every student should be generous with themself after such a try-

ing year, when no one can be faulted for struggling to meet personal, academic or professional goals. Just as importantly, every one of us should extend patience and empathy to the people around us, who have also endured a year of loss and isolation. In the year ahead, as we all emerge from this collective trauma, our ability to recover will depend on our ability to find support and camaraderie in each other.

In addition to changing our relationships with each other, the pandemic has also changed our relationship with technology. One year after necessity forced many of us to download Zoom for the first time, the app is now a staple resource, one that is likely here to stay.

Though not without its drawbacks, Zoom has made Tufts’ public events accessible to a wider range of people and has allowed a wide range of guests to come and speak. This

accessibility is important, and even once in-person gatherings become more common, it will be important for student groups and the university itself to be technologically flexible, accommodating those whose circumstances make remote attendance easier.

Another lesson that the university in particular should take away from this past year is the importance of accessible mental health services. According to one study, 56% of young adults reported symptoms of anxiety and/or depressive disorder during the pandemic, pointing to just how essential Tufts’ own Counseling and Mental Health Services is on our campus.

Tufts must take the initiative to increase funding for Counseling and Mental Health Services; this should include heeding our previous call to redirect funds from the Tufts University Police Department, something that could allow Counseling and

BY JUJU ZWEIFACH

Mental Health Services to hire additional clinicians, possibly increase hours and better support students on campus.

The past year has been a year of crisis — not just in mental and physical health, but also in the racism, the financial hardship and the political instability that came to characterize 2020. But going forward, we could all learn from those students and groups who have heeded the call and stood up for their fellow students from the very beginning of this new era. These include the Women’s Center and Asian American Center, which collected perishable and nonperishable goods for students who remained on campus after last March; Tufts Mutual Aid, which set up a food pantry, raised funds for students in need and advocated for students whose requests to remain on campus had been denied; and the FIRST Center, whose Unexpected Hardship Fund, supported by a $50,000 transfer from TCU Senate, paid for flights and UPS storage for low-income students. As we confront new crises in the future, as well as the existing structural inequalities that permeate American society, Tufts students should all aspire to emulate this heroism from the earliest days of the pandemic.

In the year since then, Tufts students have continued to perform their civic duties both on and away from campus. Tufts students joined local and national protests in the Movement for Black Lives across the country last summer, and since then members of the Tufts community have continued to speak out

against anti-Black and anti-Asian racism. We must make sure that the “normalcy” we arrive at as the pandemic wanes is not the society we lived in before the pandemic, but one where these forces of hate have no place.

A year of life in a pandemic has also created a virtual wall between Tufts and its host communities, as virus safety measures have left us unable to attend the theaters, festivals and events that we once shared with the people of Medford and Somerville. But as these local communities face continued economic hardship after a year of lockdowns, it is our obligation to extend care to Medford and Somerville by shopping locally, volunteering and donating to pantries and crowdfunding efforts like the Somerville Cares Fund and Medford Aid Mutual and Somerville. Above all, we must continue to abide by virus safety rules during the coming months in order to keep our neighbors safe.

One year after this pandemic first uprooted all of our lives, we’re beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel, and it’s time to start thinking about what “normal” should look like on the other end. We have the power to sustain a community that is empathetic and compassionate.

We have the power to respond to crises, and to root out forces of hate in our midst. We have the power to tear down the barriers that separate Tufts and its host communities. All of these are possible so long as we students push our university administration and our peers to embrace this vision of what Tufts could become.

VIEWPOINTS

by Jake Blum

The case for continuing open-book testing post-pandemic

Contributing Writer

A year ago, an open-book test was thought of as a great privilege — a sort of breath of fresh air from the tedium of constant memorization.

Then, everything changed.

As COVID-19 spread, our methods of learning had to adapt.

Zoom became a staple of many institutions, and unproctored tests became commonplace in the absence of a viable alternative. However, many instructors realized that an unproctored test with conventional regulations would yield astronomically higher rates of academic misconduct, and thus opted for an entirely different route: open-book tests.

And honestly, in many cases this route is much better.

The beauty of these open-book tests is their unorthodox approach to a worthwhile objective — rather than testing a student’s ability to regurgitate information, these exams measure an individual’s

ability to apply said information.

As a result, students are compelled to understand the material to a much fuller extent than they would on a test based on solely the recollection of information.

I must note, though, that this is by no means a one-size-fits-all proposal. For example, my primary areas of study in biology and chemistry require sufficient knowledge — and memorization — of a wide breadth of subject matter to be successful in such fields. In courses like these, a closed-book test is far more effective in evaluating a student’s skills and comprehension of a subject, as it examines one’s ability to quickly and accurately pull and synthesize information from various topics to formulate an answer. It is far more important in professions involving subjects like these to proficiently recall specifics in addition to having various applications of said specifics; in these cases, memorization is an integral part of understanding.

However, in subjects like physics, engineering or many of the liberal arts — where it is rare to find a simple answer to a problem in one’s notes — open-book exams allow students greater opportunity to show their comprehension of concepts. By allowing individuals to look at their textbooks or notes, an instructor can more effectively test the applications of knowledge and students’ analytical and problem-solving abilities, instead of their capacity to recall minutiae.

Furthermore, students who are engaged and thorough in their note-taking are given an advantage: a chance to show their diligence in an exam-taking environment. Making open-book testing a norm would spur the creation of exams that emphasize inventive applications of a subject’s learning objectives to reach a solution; these types of problems better promote critical thinking than surface-level questions designed to check information retention rather than understanding.

It is understandable to raise concerns about the academic integrity of unsupervised openbook tests. However, in a controlled environment, such as an in-person exam room, it is extremely difficult to dishonestly share answers without the notice of a proctor. Thus, although a student has all of their information in front of them, their understanding of the information is still theirs and theirs alone. Courses could require that students solely bring their own work and submit copies of their notes along with the exam to maintain individual accountability. Even though, at the moment, it may be difficult to monitor students to make sure they’re acting alone, in a future with no masks or distancing, it would be far more feasible to effectively implement an honest open-note evaluation.

In addition, open-book tests would not discourage learning and engagement, as some may fear.

In a time-sensitive environment, continually consulting a textbook

to navigate unfamiliar material would prove inefficient. Students would still have to earnestly study course material and understand it in great depth in order to apply it on an exam. Even with a wealth of knowledge available, students would have to be intelligent, agile consumers of information to identify the salient content for composing responses and solutions.

While notes and textbooks provide helpful support, they would not supplant deep learning.

Although not the case for every subject, a shift toward primarily open-book examinations would prove extremely beneficial for students and instructors alike. Students are tasked with developing a more thorough comprehension of a concept, leading to more advanced, practical and application-based skills. From this, instructors can more effectively gauge a student’s proficiency in a field by measuring their true fluency in a subject rather than their ability to recall vast see OPEN-BOOK, page 11

Opi n i o n

Monday, March 15, 2021 | Opinion | THE TUFTS DAILY

VIEWPOINTS

A call for open dialogue about impostor syndrome during the pandemic

by Darya Clark

Contributing Writer

For many, the pandemic has been marked by feelings of isolation and loneliness, exacerbating the already prominent mental health issues among university students. Attending college during a pandemic demands that students commit the same amount of time and effort to school work without some of the social support systems available in a typical year. Students no longer share the collective experience of grappling with these challenges alongside their peers, whether it be in the classroom or in study groups. At a competitive university, the diminution or absence of community ties this year may intensify feelings of inadequacy and a lack of belonging.

As of 2021, Tufts University ranks within the top 30 universities nationally.

According to the Class of 2024 profile, of the 23,127 applicants, only 3,770 were accepted. Of the Class of 2020, 93% of students completed at least one internship while at Tufts. Of the same class, 94% was employed, enrolled in graduate school or participating in service or a fellowship within six months of graduation, with top employers including Google, Goldman Sachs and Microsoft. By all quantifiable accounts, Tufts is a competitive and high-achieving university. This environment of success and hard work often leads to students having feelings of inadequacy and fraudulence, described as “impostor syndrome.” First named by Dr. Pauline Clance in her clinical observations, it has been noted in the International Journal of Behavioral Science that “individuals with the Impostor Phenomenon experience intense feelings that their achievements are undeserved and worry that they are likely to be exposed as a fraud.”

In her book “The Secret Thoughts of Successful Women” (2011), Valerie Young identifies patterns in impostor feelings.

Some of these patterns may resonate with students on this campus. “The Perfectionist” is someone who sets extremely high standards for themself and, even after accomplishing most of their goals, will lose all confidence in themself with one small mistake. “The Expert” feels like they must know everything and meet all qualifications before applying for a job or club and won’t ask a question or volunteer an answer in class for fear of sounding silly to their peers

and professors. “The natural genius” is accustomed to skills and academics coming easily, associating struggle or adversity with not being good enough. A “soloist” feels as though they must accomplish everything on their own and that asking for help is a point of weakness and failure.

Attendance at a competitive university like Tufts may mark the first time some students are not the most successful or driven individuals within a given classroom. In a normal year, these revelations can lead a student to develop feelings of incompetence, though ease of access to community can mitigate these feelings and affirm that students are not alone in their challenges. However, the pandemic has left students in nearly complete isolation during their learning, without communal spaces to contextualize their shared challenges and solve problems together. Students often do not know who is in their virtual classes, as many turn their cameras off. This environment makes it increasingly difficult for students to form study groups and to learn from each other and grow together. Zoom eliminates the potential for spontaneous side conversations, as students no longer have the ability to turn to a fellow classmate to ask questions about course content or the professor’s expectations.

Furthermore, students have limited outlets to alleviate stress and cultivate new social connections. This further distances students from their peers, making school an individualistic activity rather than a collaborative experience. This level of isolation facilitates internal doubts and anxieties. Students are vulnerable to negative thoughts related to lack of self-worth

or capability, with little to no realm of comparison for how other students are doing. Many students may simply live at Tufts without feeling like part of a community. Lacking a sense of belonging and opportunities to connect, it appears inevitable that students face impostor syndrome more prominently this year.

This issue can only be combated if it is addressed. The difference between those who experience impostor syndrome and those who do not is not a matter of competency, intelligence or ability, but a matter of outlook. To tackle the issue, we must first initiate conversations within our community to acknowledge it. Impostor syndrome is, in part, a byproduct of isolation. Although nerve-wracking, whenever feasible, students should turn their cameras on in class. This simple effort can bridge a small part of the gap between Zoom rooms and an authentic classroom experience, making it easier to recognize faces or even feel comfortable messaging someone about coursework. Furthermore, professors should offer virtual spaces for students to meet or post a sign-up sheet for students to form groups to communicate about school work and support each other throughout the course. After a year of isolation, it can be terrifying to take the first step of introducing oneself and, even more daunting, to openly talk about one’s experience of self-doubt. However, every student at Tufts is passionate and capable, and deserves to be reminded of their greatness daily.

11

Matt Rice The Honeymoon Period

I

President Joe Manchin

continued from page 10 reserves of information in a 90-minute period — a scenario with limited analogues in the professional world. Additionally, a student who does well in an environment where they can access their material gets rewarded for their attentiveness and engagement with the material throughout the semester, rather than for a last-minute cram session that prioritizes short-term retention at the expense of longterm outcomes.

There are many practices that most people would like to leave behind with the pandemic when the time comes. However, open-book testing, in many cases, should not be one of them, due to its promotion of far more critical and analytical minds — the minds our generation needs to succeed in the future.

t has become increasingly clear in the first 50 days of his presidency that Joe Biden may not even be the most important “Joe” in Washington. West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, who has consistently inhabited the vanishing political center, has had and will continue to have the final say over what President Biden can get through Congress.

On the day the U.S. Senate passed the American Rescue Plan, Manchin was watched closely by D.C. journalists. His blessing would land Biden a major legislative victory; his dissent would have severely wounded the entire Biden agenda.

Ultimately, Manchin voted for the bill after hours of progressive Democrats’ scaling back unemployment benefits to his liking. His vote also helped secure billions of dollars in funding for rural hospitals in West Virginia, a staggering number considering the state’s size.

Manchin has had outsized influence over the confirmation of the Biden cabinet.

With Republicans united against Neera Tanden’s nomination to head the Office of Management and Budget, Manchin’s opposition had all but sunk her chances.

Manchin’s support for Interior Secretary nominee Deb Haaland has made her confirmation a virtual certainty.

A Washington Post article last week asked an important question: Should Senate Democrats go big, or go bipartisan?

But as I wrote last week, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell will make the latter option nearly impossible. Adam Jentleson, who was a deputy chief of staff to former Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid, wrote in a tweet that bipartisanship in the Senate is not a “real option.”

Joe Manchin stands firmly in the opposite camp. The West Virginian said on Meet The Press last week that he will not change his stance on upholding the filibuster, meaning every aspect of the Biden agenda — from infrastructure to health care, climate to education — will require a minimum of 10 Republican votes for Senate passage.

But even if the filibuster were to be done away with, Manchin would still be an obstacle. He recently took over the chairmanship of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, and considering his representation of the dying coal industry and his state’s reliance on the fuel, the Green New Deal has been shelved for the foreseeable future.

On infrastructure, Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg saw an opening during this honeymoon period of 100 days, but Manchin seems to have kneecapped those ambitions. Senate Republicans tried to persuade Biden to cut $1.3 trillion from his American Rescue Plan, which makes one wonder how much they would be willing to spend on our abysmal transportation system. On top of that, Manchin said he would single handedly kill Biden’s $2 trillion infrastructure and climate bill if it does not include Republican support.

Manchin’s one vote currently wields more power than any single senator in recent memory. The closely divided upper chamber has always been an undemocratic, unrepresentative institution, so we should not hold out hope for them to confront these perilous challenges.

Jake Blum is a first-year studying biomedical engineering. Jake can be reached at jacob.blum@tufts.edu.

Matt Rice is a senior studying political science. Matt can be reached at matthew.rice@tufts.edu.

Darya Clark is a first-year studying biomedical engineering. Darya can be reached at darya.clark@tufts.edu.

ASLI KOCAK / THE TUFTS DAILY

To promote engagement, professors should extend use of open-book tests OPEN-BOOK

SAM FARBMAN / THE TUFTS DAILY

Monday, March 15, 2021

SPORTS

12 tuftsdaily.com

Spring athletes reflect on lost 2020 season, year without sports

by Ananda Kao Sports Editor

During halftime of a Tufts men’s lacrosse game against Ithaca College on Tuesday, March 10, 2020, head coach Casey D’Annolfo pulled his team together for a halftime speech no coach could have imagined giving. D’Annolfo had to inform his players that the game, only the team’s fourth game of the season, would be its last. A year ago, Tufts’ spring sports teams were just getting started when the season was pulled out from under them.

Hunter Watts, a sophomore midfielder on the men’s lacrosse team, recalled the whirlwind of events leading up to his coach’s halftime speech.

“I remember that Monday night … we were just going over how Amherst canceled, Middlebury canceled, and we were thinking, ‘Wow, there’s no way where our season’s going to get canceled, we’ll find a way to make it happen,'” Watts said.

When he and his teammates were informed of the news the next day, they were shocked.

“It took a while to process it honestly, the whole next week it was just so weird — it was different,” Watts said.

Once the NESCAC canceled spring sports due to the pandemic, hundreds of athletes, coaches and athletics staff members were forced to abandon plans and shift their lives within days.

For many Tufts spring sport student-athletes, the news was hard to swallow.

“It was definitely heartbreaking. There were a lot of tears shed. It was just tough in the moment, especially because we didn’t realize how serious COVID was. Looking back, obviously we all believe that was the correct

Isaac Karp Power to the Players

The NBA bubble and the questions it raised

O

n March 11, 2020, the NBA postponed its season after Utah Jazz center Rudy Gobert tested positive for COVID-19. It felt like one of the first dominoes to fall in terms of the end of normality in America. With basketball gone, many NBA players spent their time campaigning for racial equality during the summer’s Black Lives Matter protests. Meanwhile, NBA executives were devising a way to finish the season in the hopes of saving some of the lost revenue. Many observers questioned whether a

decision. But at the moment, it didn’t help at all,” Becca Gable, a sophomore defender on the women’s lacrosse team, said.

For Gable and other spring sport athletes, the lost season brings up thoughts of what could have been.

“We were three games in and were finally hitting our stride,” Gable said. The team was fresh off a come-from-behind win against conference rival Amherst.

“It went from one day making jokes to the next day, everyone getting sent home, so it was definitely really really tough,” Gable said. “We definitely had a great squad last year and we were going to go far if not all the way, so it’s just hard to see that go.”

Most students were asked to pack up their belongings and return home two months earlier than they ordinarily would have.

Suddenly, all the lifts, sprints and practices no longer had an end goal in sight. For many seniors, they would never step foot on the field, court or track again.

Jack Schwartz, a sophomore pitcher on the baseball team, remembers the impact the abrupt end to the season had on his senior teammates.

“The hardest thing … was being in our locker room and seeing [the seniors] crying, that was just one thing that was really hard for me,” Schwartz said. “All the seniors were coming up to the [first-years] and were like, ‘You guys will carry on our legacy, we really hope that you guys can play next year.’ They were thinking that far ahead and were thinking more about us than them,” Schwartz said.

Besides being blindsided by the cancellation of athletic competition and in-person classes, nobody could imagine the impending longevity of the pandemic when it hit just over a year

ago. Many athletes believed it would all blow over by the fall.

A month into the spring 2021 semester and still no Tufts sports team has played a game. Spring sports teams have been able to participate in physically distanced, small-group practices for much of this year, even though the prospect of a season was up in the air.

These practices were valuable for many student-athletes who enjoy working on their game and spending time with their teammates.

“In the fall it was really nice because we got to practice as a team, socially distanced, of course,” sophomore Michelle Adelman, an outfielder on the softball team, said. “It was just really fun being able to practice with everyone even though we didn’t know when we [would] play our first competition, we [knew] that competition [was] coming at some point.”

Practicing and training during a pandemic with no games in sight was not easy for many athletes, but teams tried to maintain positive attitudes.

“Expectations were kind of low, but everyone seemed to keep an optimistic approach towards things … [and] we were approaching it like [we were] gonna play,” Schwartz said.

“Guys on our team really just wanted to be out there and they just love baseball so much that they’re going to train hard no matter what.”

Some athletes realized during the pandemic that relationships with teammates and coaches are tightened during the season; they felt they lost part of that last year.

“During the season, I think that’s where you really start to form those meaningful bonds and connections,” Watts said.

“When you’re competing and actually trying to win, you kind of just get in that groove and everybody gets on the same page — the chemistry gels. So yeah, it’s been very testing.”

Others felt that the extra time and unique circumstances provided by the pandemic allowed them to create closer, more unique bonds with different people on their teams.

“We found ourselves in a lot of unique situations where we’d be hanging out after practice, social distancing, and would realize that people didn’t really hang out like this before COVID,” Gable said. “I feel like everyone got closer because so many conversations were opened … really genuinely checking in on things like mental health just because everyone was going through such big changes in their lives.”

Many Tufts athletes said their coaches have played an instrumental role in supporting them during the year without sports. This support often came in the form of open communication and advice.

Schwartz reflected on a motto from his coach that resonated

league predominantly made up of African American men would commit to basketball in the face of the issue of police brutality.

But when LeBron James said he would play if circumstances permitted, the answer was clear. In the words of Los Angeles Clippers guard Patrick Beverly: “If [LeBron James] said he hooping. We all hooping.” In other words, when James talks, everyone listens.

The NBA set up a bubble in Orlando where players could choose to finish the season, although players remained divided over whether to devote themselves to basketball or the pursuit of social justice. Some players, like former Los Angeles Lakers guard Avery Bradley, considered the bubble unsafe because of the imminent threat of the pandemic. Brooklyn Nets guard Kyrie Irving worried that resuming basketball would sideline issues of racial equality.

NBA players became some of the loudest and most influential voices in the campaign to end

police brutality. Moreover, leaving for the bubble meant concentrating the majority of players in Florida for three months — isolated from their families and communities.

The athletes resolved their dilemma by demanding the league support them in their work toward social justice. The NBA elected not to enforce the rule requiring players to stand for the national anthem; “Black Lives Matter” was painted onto the courts in large, unmissable letters; and both players and broadcasters were given free rein to voice their opinions about these issues. Utah Jazz guard Donovan Mitchell and Boston Celtics forward Jaylen Brown brought attention to Black Americans who lost their lives to police brutality at every press conference or interview.

Many players recounted stories of being profiled or stopped by an officer because of the color of their skin. For a moment, it seemed that a unified group of

athletes had kept their promise to amplify the voices of the marginalized.

Then the shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wis. almost burst the bubble. Blake was shot seven times in the back from point blank range in front of his children. A video of the shooting was captured by a neighbor and quickly went viral. Without notifying the rest of the league, the Milwaukee Bucks, who play their home games about 40 miles north of Kenosha, did not take the court for their playoff game against the Orlando Magic. George Hill, a guard for the Bucks, summed up the team’s reaction when he said, “We shouldn’t have came to this damn place to be honest.”

NBA players in the bubble soon met for a closed-door meeting in order to figure out their next step. Many were frustrated that the Bucks did not give warning before they protested the game because it fractured the look of a unified front. With emotions running high, the two

with him and his friends on the baseball team.

“One of our coach’s phrases that he says all the time is, ‘Know no other way.’ I think that’s been a pretty big message, especially during this time,” Schwartz said. “What he means is, we all love baseball, we try super hard in practice, we try super hard in games. But, if you’re cleaning your room, you know no other way than to work hard. So, you clean your room really hard or you go to class and study really hard …

So, that’s definitely been a message that has resonated with me in these times.”

On Tuesday, the NESCAC announced that it would allow spring sports competition to resume in April. Even though it has yet to announce further details, this is the most hope spring athletes have had in over a year.

“I love structure and having lacrosse back — real practice and real purpose. When we practice, I think it’s going to ultimately be good for all of us and it’s gonna end up being a really great semester,” Gable said.

Alex Sharp contributed reporting to this article.

ALEXANDER THOMPSON / THE TUFTS DAILY

The Tufts women’s lacrosse team plays a match against MIT at Bello Field on March 4, 2020.

Los Angeles teams voted to boycott the season, and it looked as though the bubble would come to an end.

The players ultimately agreed to finish the playoffs, but the hope for cohesion in the face of injustice had not come to fruition. Some critics argued that bringing the NBA playoffs back had stalled enthusiasm for protests by returning entertainment to the general public.

Did the players manage to have it both ways, to play and provide needed distraction amid a harsh pandemic and civil unrest while also advancing the cause of social justice? Clearly, the question of whether players should have continued their season in the bubble is neither straightforward nor simple. But what happened in Orlando will never be forgotten.

Isaac Karp is a first-year who has not yet declared a major. Isaac can be reached at isaac.karp@tufts.edu.