By Hunter Hine
The University of Maryland expanded distribution of KN95 masks, added on-campus COVID-19 testing days for asymptomatic individuals and implemented a QR-code-based COVID-19 contact tracing system in classrooms, according to several messages from UMD administrators.
Administrators bought 50,000 KN95 masks to distribute to students, faculty and staff for free beginning on Sept. 20, University Health Center Director Spyridon Marinopoulos announced in an email Sept. 17. Another 20,000 masks were added to the order, Marinopoulos said in a message on Sept. 24. The masks are available around campus, according to Marinopoulos.
Amir Kalantary, a senior economics and government double major, works the information desk at Adele H. Stamp Student Union, a site that distributes masks.
“Lunch rush, it’s usually like every person who comes to the desk is asking for a mask,” Kalantry said. “A lot of people ask for two and we have to politely say that we can only give out one, just because the demand is so high.”
“When it’s busiest, like in maybe thirty minutes, eight people or 10 people will ask for masks, so it’s pretty constant,” Kalantary said.
Joyce Seoyoung Jang is a first-year master’s student in the student affairs program who said she would feel safer in crowded outdoor areas like the First Look Fair if more people wore masks.
“I think maybe I’m just nervous because I was in L.A. when one in three people had COVID,” she said. “Compared to there, here is so much laxer.”
Beginning the week of Sept. 20, UMD administrators made COVID-19 testing available to asymptomatic individuals for two extra days each week at Maryland Stadium. Testing will now be held on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., in addition to Mondays and Thursdays, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Unvaccinated people are still required to be tested at the stadium twice a week on Mondays and Thursdays. Symptomatic testing is available at the Health Center tent site, Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., according to the Sept. 17 message from Marinopoulos.
QR codes were implemented in classrooms across campus to help streamline contact tracing, Provost Jennifer King Rice wrote in an email to the campus community Sept. 27. By scanning the QR code before class, students and faculty will be notified if someone in the same class tests positive for COVID-19, according to Rice’s email.
Leilani Alvarenga, a junior early childhood and special education major, said she approved of the changes.
“I think it’s good what they’re doing, because I wouldn’t want to go back online, even though it was good,” Alvarenga said, “The measures being done are helpful, and they’re helping us to stay safe as well. So I hope we can end this semester in person.”
School of Public Health associate research professor Dr. Kathleen McPhaul thinks the changing protocol is a sign the administration is listening to feedback. McPhaul researches occupational and public health, has experience with COVID-19 contact tracing and works with the Public Health Aerobiology, Virology and Exhaled Biomarker Laboratory Lab, according to the School of Public Health website.
“There are good controls out there, as far as I can tell, but they’re not perfect, right? So I’m not sure we can reach perfection with human behavior and with also trying to give, let people live their lives, and go to school and be in classrooms,” said McPhaul about the recent COVID-19 protocol changes.
“The thing about the changes in particular I’ve noticed, that whenever there’s a ramp up … of the recommendations, it seems to bother people a lot, and I would just say, you know, sorta thank God for changes because to me it’s a sign of taking input,” McPhaul said.
“Either getting input from science or pushback from students and parents … I think that’s a sign of some responsiveness that should make people feel better.”
Featured image: COVID-19 testing for symptomatic individuals is being held at the University Health Center tent site. Symptomatic testing is available Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Photo by Hunter Hine.