Students describe the quarantine scene at SUNY Oneonta

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    ONEONTA, N.Y. (The Post-Star) — Whitehall resident Olivia Ruby got two weeks of college before it closed.

Ruby enrolled at SUNY Oneonta this fall to major in theater and studio and digital arts. After a disappointing end to high school, she had high hopes for college.

Every class meets online, from her dorm room. But outside of class, she was able to meet fellow artists with whom she connected deeply. She tried out for the fall play and got a lead role. Things were going well.

Then the campus closed Sunday after more than 100 students tested positive for coronavirus.

“We are quarantined to our dorm. Pretty much they want us to stay in our dorm room,” she said by phone from her dorm. “They deliver meals to us. They come to our doors.”

Ruby and her roommate have not tested positive, so they can leave the dorm to go for walks. The new rules say that no one can be in a group of more than two people, and students cannot go to town. Doordash has become a favorite app as students order takeout, delivered to their dormitory entrance.

The library and every other building are closed.

In good news, the play she is in was chosen for quarantine readiness. There are just two roles in “Love Letters,” and they do not interact directly.

Ruby is hoping the quarantine will be just two weeks — but other students do not seem to be cooperating.

“We were telling people, ‘Don’t go to a party, it’s not worth it.’ Everyone is really like, ‘Can you not go party, please?’ There’s a lot of seniors saying that too,” she said. “A lot of us are doing the right thing. It’s just a select number of people.”

But it only takes one infected student to spread it throughout a gathering in which no one is wearing masks.

At this point, Ruby isn’t confident that the partying students will change their ways.

“A part of me hopes this is only two weeks and people are smart about it but people are human. They’re not going to stay in for two weeks,” she said.

Other local students are furious about their fellow students’ behavior.

Grace Kinne of South Glens Falls, a junior majoring in history at SUNY Oneonta, left her off-campus apartment and went back home Saturday.

She has severe asthma and got bronchitis twice last year from colds, so she wanted to be careful to not get coronavirus.

But after doing her first two years at SUNY Adirondack while living at home, this was supposed to be her moment.

“This is my opportunity to grow up and get some freedom and live on my own. And within a week I’m back home because people can’t wear a mask,” she said, adding that she was “very mad” at the partiers for ruining it for everyone.

On move-in day, she saw large groups of students walking together without masks. There were parties every night. In her complex, across the street from the campus, beer cans lined the porches.

At new-student orientation, they were all warned they had to act responsibly or face discipline, but until Sunday, she said, no one seemed to get in trouble. Then a few students were suspended for hosting parties, but no one was punished for attending a party without a mask.

“On Tuesday we got an email: Two students tested positive — which we were expecting. We knew some kids would test positive. But then Wednesday it was 16, and it just kept going up,” she said. “It got out of control very, very fast. It was like a tidal wave.”

Within days of moving in, she found herself essentially trapped in her apartment complex because of the crowds of partiers.

“Even on Friday, when they had 56 confirmed cases, my neighbors were still throwing parties. I could hear them til 3 a.m. I didn’t want to go out into my hallway. I didn’t know if they were wearing masks,” she said. “My roommate and I barely left our apartment.”

Now she’s taking her classes from home. She packed up everything, not knowing when she and her roommate would return to their apartment.

“We were hoping to come back in a week, maybe two, but we honestly don’t know what’s going to happen,” she said. “I’d rather not go back and get exposed.”

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