One Week Into Semester UNC Announces All Undergrad Course Work Will Transition to Online

Submitted by HelloHeisman91 on August 17th, 2020 at 4:02 PM
https://twitter.com/dailytarheel/status/1295447961477033985?s=21
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yoyo

August 17th, 2020 at 6:36 PM ^

You gotta feel bad for them on some level. Their kids have devoted their entire lives to the sports and some of them have a good shot at making a professional league but won't get to showcase their talent. Consider a guy like Chris Evans who lost last season due to a poor decision but spent the entire year doing everything he needed to get back on the team and this happens. Not everyone has everything set up for the NFL and is as annoying as online student Justin Fields. I think it's okay to acknowledge that this sucks for a lot of people who are sacrificing a lot. 

Joined: 02/11/2011

MGoPoints: 8253

Wendyk5

August 17th, 2020 at 7:50 PM ^

My kid plays college baseball. He missed last season, summer training, and who knows what's going to happen this year. It may seem trivial compared to what a lot of other people are going through right now but these guys have a very small window of playing time, whether they're trying to play at the next level or not. There will be an end date and it will be over, sooner rather than later. So yeah, I do feel for these guys. It really sucks. 

Joined: 11/20/2008

MGoPoints: 67773

East German Judge

August 17th, 2020 at 8:21 PM ^

While I get your point, I might be inclined to look at the bigger picture and think that a) they are all still pretty healthy, b) they mitigate the risk of any injury during the football season, and c) while I know this is a sports blog and I love sports just as much as anybody else, the players' loss pales in comparison to the 160k families who have lost a loved one due to the 'rona AND the countless more who have recovered, but still face physical challenges for the rest of their lives.

Joined: 10/05/2014

MGoPoints: 190481

Mitch Cumstein

August 17th, 2020 at 4:08 PM ^

I get that there are clusters of cases, etc. but I’m also wondering just a little if this wasn’t the plan all along and the “in-person” return was to retain as much attendance (and tuition) as possible for the semester.

Joined: 10/02/2009

MGoPoints: 14072

Naked Bootlegger

August 17th, 2020 at 6:11 PM ^

I sure wish off-campus rentals would be pro-rated.  But leases signed last December for the current academic year are quite unforgiving. 

If my daughter comes home from Ann Arbor in the next month or two and is told to stay there until next spring, it will sicken me to pay a shit ton of money to a large Ann Arbor property management company that, to my best estimates, is collecting at least $50K per month for a bunch of students to live in an aging apartment complex near State and Packard.   

I sure wish she had opted for the res hall this year - there's at least a modicum of hope for a partial housing refund from the university.

Joined: 01/28/2011

MGoPoints: 34714

Go Blue Eyes

August 17th, 2020 at 4:44 PM ^

If tuition and such are due today and they haven’t paid then they can just not pay and skip the semester.  If they don’t refund original payments after going on list at the last minute look for the lawsuits to commence.  
 

This whole Covid virus is turning into the ambulance chasers Utopia. 

Joined: 12/04/2010

MGoPoints: 12683

Go Blue Eyes

August 17th, 2020 at 4:57 PM ^

I can't seem to find the pertinent info for this year but last fall (classes started 9/2) and a student had until 9/23 to drop classes for a 100% refund minus registration fees and a disenrollment fee. 

If UM goes online after the first week and doesn't offer refund, as I said above, the lawsuits are going to start flying.  We "lost" about $1300 when our son had to leave his dorm and they only sent us a check for less than a prorated amount.  I was more than willing as an alum myself to eat the $1300 and chip in to help the University along.  I WON'T be so willing a second time.

Joined: 12/04/2010

MGoPoints: 12683

Jonesy

August 17th, 2020 at 4:12 PM ^

Alternatively they could expel all the dumbasses until theyre left with just serious students with half a brain remaining.

Would be nice to live in a grown up country. A friend of mine's brother just moved to Taiwan for a year (well his wife and kids will be there for a year as they have dual citizenship, he can only stay for 3 months). Theyre basically on house arrest for two weeks. They have government sim cards in their phones and they make sure they dont leave the apartment. They have daily random checks to make sure theyre still in the apartment. The security guard goes home at 7pm so they cant get food delivered after that so they had a friend who lives in the apartment building bring them food and their neighbor called the cops on them who came to make sure they weren't breaking the rules (they weren't). After two weeks are up hes going to go out to a steak dinner, to a bar, and to a baseball game and going to live his life normally because hes in a country that isnt ruled by and populated with children.

Joined: 03/14/2012

MGoPoints: 10559

Mitch Cumstein

August 17th, 2020 at 4:55 PM ^

You’ll have to take my word that I’m a mask-wearing, precaution/rule cooperating, sensible individual. But man, this place has gotten... weird? Would not surprise me to see praise of the Chinese govt for welding people suspected of having the virus in their apartments. They have it under control so that must be what “grown-up” countries do after all.

Joined: 10/02/2009

MGoPoints: 14072

Gulogulo37

August 18th, 2020 at 12:48 AM ^

I just got back to Korea and I was in quarantine. Yes, I had to have an app with location tracking on at all times. It's just to make sure I don't leave my apartment. Conflating that with having my door welded shut is ridiculous. I uninstalled the app the second I was done with quarantine. No one outside of quarantine is being tracked for anything. Then I almost immediately got a haircut (with no mask on), and took a flight to Jeju (the vacation island in the south) and went to the beach and went surfing for a few days. I'd say maybe 10 percent of the people there wore masks. Even people in convenience stores weren't wearing one. Having been back home recently, it's hilarious that people think things are more restrictive in Korea than America.

Joined: 03/16/2010

MGoPoints: 28318

garde

August 17th, 2020 at 4:48 PM ^

Our country is a shit hole and has been for decades. We're uneducated, uncultured, selfish, have a crumbling infrastructure, and a government loaded with hacks who are only there to make money (both sides). Our education system blows. And before someone tosses out the stat that more Americans have a college education than ever before, trust me, I went to graduate school abroad. The four Americans in the program (who all graduated from top 20 schools in the USA), were lost in the math based classes. Things that we touched on in college math, the global students learned either before or at the beginning of high school. Moreover, a college degree means nothing for 90% who have one in this country. It's just a piece of paper. Most people lack any critical thinking skills and get their news from FB and Twitter. Add in the fact that in the1970s, the Republican party made the decision to cater to the religious right, and it's no wonder why half our country operates like a first world religious state. The only thing separating their mindsets from the religious zealots in other countries like Afghanistan is the perceived wealth of our nation. We have corporations who have shifted to a gig economy that strip all benefits from workers, real wages have flatlined, there's almost no middle class, 40% of Americans are one paycheck away from poverty, and public debt is about to crush most Americans. The drivel and whining about "no college football" just reinforces how this country is done. And I didn't even bring up issues of racism, health care, and the lack of concern for the environment. Personal freedoms go hand in hand with sacrifice and responsibility. Without the latter two, our social experiment fails. In my mind, it already has. Christ, people can't even wearing a fucking mask. Buckle up...doesn't matter who wins the next election...the next decade is going to be rocky at best.

Joined: 02/26/2015

MGoPoints: 1958

Glanville

August 17th, 2020 at 4:58 PM ^

Maybe the hillbillies who got suckered into believing that fighting a non-existent cultural war was more important than jobs, roads, insurance, etc. will wake up before the billionaires who run this country and publicly make fun of them have fleeced them to the bone, but I doubt it.  Yes, we're weak selfish cowards.  We wouldn't fight the Nazis today.   

Joined: 02/24/2014

MGoPoints: 533

Bergs

August 17th, 2020 at 6:15 PM ^

Canada and the Scandinavian countries consistently rank higher than us in every desirable metric (economic mobility, education, life expectancy). Germany does pretty well, too. But if you want the country with the highest overall GDP, percent population imprisoned, and firearm-related deaths, boy, you can't get much better than the US of A!

Joined: 09/09/2011

MGoPoints: 2867