A Letter to the Students Breaking Quarantine
By: Anna Kim
Thank you for posting pictures and videos that flaunt your disregard for rules. Thank you for being so open about your lack of social responsibility. I am returning to campus on Feb. 13, and I am terrified for not only my safety, but also for the safety of our community. I urge you to think beyond yourself. Think about our faculty and low-income students.
For those of us who elected to return to campus in the next few days, our quarantine, as instructed by Dr. Lilly, started seven days before our arrival dates (2/4-2/6). According to Dean Moriarity’s email sent to all students on Feb. 3, quarantine entails staying at home, not participating in any activities outside your home and having no visitors, only leaving for medical appointments, and only going outside for exercise with a mask with 6 or more feet of distance, Considering the behavior I have witnessed on social media, I’m afraid that these guidelines have not been heeded. I’ve already seen too many posts which explicitly neglect the rules outlined by the Academy. How many more students aren’t following quarantine precautions in private?
Academy guidelines are here to protect our community. According to the CDC, you can test negative and then test positive later in your infection. In a potential scenario, you could be exposed right before arriving on campus, say, on Feb. 12, and test positive after Exeter’s strict quarantine ends on Feb. 22 (10 days after exposure).
We must think of the adults in our community. Consider faculty who live in our dorms and don’t have an option to reside off-campus. An anonymous faculty quotation in an Exonian article published on Sept. 12 highlights their worries of safety. “I disagree with the Academy’s decision to reopen. I have a family with young children, and the deleterious behavior of COVID-19 with the many unknowns make it very risky to be exposed to so many people from so many parts of the world,” they said. A sufficient quarantine is not only for our own health. Faculty families who will be living with us during this uncertain time are at a risk of their health, and we have a responsibility to make sure to do everything we can do to limit the potential COVID risks for them.
We must also think about the students who need Exeter because it provides equity in ways their home may not. For those students, they experience many disadvantageous factors such as a lack of steady internet, uncertainty about housing and the need to work to help their families.
The Association of Low-income Exonians (ALIE) published a piece in The Exonian on Oct. 29, stating, “Simply put, having a supportive and functional working environment is a luxury not always afforded to low-income students. Low-income students may not be physically able to find a space where they can work alone.” Coming to Exeter is a privilege, but some people need the Academy’s resources more than others. Let’s think about them. When you violate quarantine, and increase your chances of being infected COVID, you are simultaneously increasing the chances of a potential campus closing — which would have dire effects for low-income students.
I urge you to consider your teachers and friends heavily before stepping outside for unessential reasons. There is no perfect plan to combat a pandemic, thus, we must be vigilant in our adherence to the Academy’s guidelines. I also hope that those arriving in March will see the importance of adhering to the quarantine procedures and the larger impacts their choices have on the Exeter community. While some people have already embarked on their travel plans, this should also serve as a reminder that we need to be extremely cautious during our on-campus quarantine. Please—is it really my job to call you out for your selfish behavior?
