The Tufts Daily - Wednesday, April 14, 2021

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T HE T UFTS DAILY

VOLUME LXXXI, ISSUE 42

tuftsdaily.com

Wednesday, April 14, 2021

MEDFORD/SOMERVILLE, MASS.

University to end COVID-19 testing, on-campus housing prior to Senior Week by Rebecca Barker

Outreach Coordinator

The university recently announced that it will end COVID-19 testing and require students living on campus to leave their housing prior to Senior Week, causing frustration and concern among many students in the senior class. The university has scheduled virtual events for Senior Week from May 17–21, as well as a virtual Commencement ceremony on May 23, but is saying that students should celebrate at home. “When students finish exams, they should take a COVID-19 test to make sure they are negative, then travel home to minimize risk of exposure to others,” Dean of Student Affairs and Chief Student Officer Camille Lizarríbar wrote in an email to the Daily. “Once home, they can engage in the virtual events planned for Senior Week and celebrate Commencement virtually with their friends and loved ones.” Though Tufts is making students who live on campus move out of their on-campus housing before these events, most of the senior class lives in off-campus houses in the Medford/ Somerville area. TCU Senate President Sarah Wiener, Vice President Grant Gebetsberger and Treasurer Sharif Hamidi conducted a survey and found that 95% of respondents had finalized plans to stay in the Medford/ Somerville area for Senior Week. They published a subsequent op-ed in the Daily on April 5, condemning Tufts for its decision to end COVID-19 testing and remove seniors from on-campus housing before Commencement. Gebetsberger, a senior, said that he is specifically concerned about the inequities this decision creates between students living on and off campus. According to Gebetsberger, Wiener and Hamidi in their op-ed, many students living on campus are on financial aid and are students of color. “I think the off-campus seniors aren’t going to change their behavior at all, but obviously on-campus seniors have no choice but to change their behavior because their housing will end,” he said. “Those are the folks that I have been most concerned about from the getgo … They won’t be able to stay and safely and socially distantly have a picnic with their friends during Senior Week outside, or

have drinks on the porch, or take [graduation] photos during that week … just those little things [are] obviously going to be much more difficult.” Lizarríbar said that she understands the disappointment and concern students feel about the university’s decision, but feels that the administration has made the correct choice regarding the virtual nature of Senior Week and Commencement. “We fully understand that some graduates and their families are upset at the decision to conduct Senior Week and Commencement virtually, and we share their disappointment that we are unable to gather safely to celebrate due to the threats that are still posed by the pandemic,” Lizarríbar said. “However, we are absolutely certain that we have made the correct, safest, most equitable and most responsible decision given what we know and what we don’t at this time.” Lizarríbar explained that the university’s decision was motivated by Massachusetts public health guidelines, and noted that variables such as new COVID19 variants, vaccine accessibility and some disregard from students regarding the university’s COVID-19 guidelines further emphasized the importance of a virtual Senior Week and Commencement. “We have an obligation to protect the health of our Tufts community and our neighbors and to treat each other equitably,” Lizarríbar said. “Students who choose to stay in the area after exams are over to participate in unofficial Senior Week and Commencement gatherings will be choosing to put community members and others at risk and creating inequities among their peers, including those who are remote.” However, the 95% of seniors who responded to the survey say they plan to stay. Additionally, 98% of survey respondents said that Tufts should continue to provide COVID-19 testing through May 23, and every single respondent said Tufts should allow seniors to remain in their on-campus housing through May 23. Gebetsberger said that while he understands that the university is unlikely to reverse its stance on extending both COVID-19 testing and on-campus housing, he would see HOUSING, page 2

NICOLE GARAY / THE TUFTS DAILY

The Medford/Somerville campus COVID-19 testing site is pictured on Sept. 20, 2020.

TEDxTufts adopts virtual format to host annual speakers conference by Ella Kamm

Contributing Writer

TEDxTufts held its seventh annual conference from April 9–11, featuring 10 virtual TEDxTufts Talks and performances. The theme, “REBOOT,” was a nod to both the virtual aspect of the event as well as the potential for growth and change coming out of the pandemic. “This year our speakers are really recontextualizing old theories and they’re readjusting in the current moment, given current events and COVID,” TEDxTufts curator Simone Barr said. “It’s sort of acknowledging that pause that takes place right before you begin again in a new direction.” She expanded on this, acknowledging the impact the current circumstances had on the content of the presentations at this year’s conference. “We’re really excited this year to share stories and suggestions for how to begin again in new directions, especially since we’ve had so much time to pause and reflect in quarantine,” Barr, a junior, said. “There’s a lot of value in being very intentional with how we power back up again.”

Speakers included people from a wide variety of interests and industries. Supriya Sanjay (LA’19), a software development engineer II at Amazon Robotics, gave a talk titled “Have You Tried Restarting It? Rebooting Diversity in the Tech Industry.” Kudrat Dutta Chaudhary (F’19), an international lawyer working in gender-based violence claims, presented “Patriarchy and Its Pillars: How We Can Crumble the System.” Tufts professor of mathematics Bruce Boghosian delivered a talk called “The Mathematics of Oligarchy.” “All of our speakers are very different,” executive organizer Saherish Surani said. “Everything is about the current moment that we’re in, but also how to look at it again and decide where to go.” The event took place over three days, with two-hour sessions held each day. The organizers said that one challenge of adjusting to the virtual format was maintaining the interpersonal aspects of a typical TEDxTufts conference and its ties to the community. “This is our seventh annual event holding an official TED

license, and every other year it’s been on stage in front of people,” Surani, a senior, said. “For the past couple of years we’ve sold out Cohen [Auditorium], we were program of the year, and I think for us it’s been a lot about having this one day that’s not just about the talks, but it’s also about building community, interacting and really being able to start spreading ideas.” According to Barr, TEDxTufts partnered with an outside film production company to produce high-quality speaker content and showcase the ideas of the talks in an engaging way. The videos were all prerecorded, mostly in Curtis Hall. “We had a lot of fun working with the external team to make sure that we have a lot of different angles and graphics,” Barr said. “It was a lot of fun to try our hand at something that we’ve never really done before, since live performance is what we’re used to.” Although it was virtual, organizers said they prioritized maintaining the interactive elements of a typical conference, and the event involved community partnerships in a variety of formats.

SPORTS / page 9

FEATURES / page 3

OPINION / page 8

Softball ascends to first place in NESCAC East after 4-game sweep of Colby

In Myanmar, Tufts students protest for democracy amid national crisis

Tufts must end its ‘back door’ elitism in admissions

see TEDXTUFTS, page 2 NEWS

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