February 26, 2020
Dear students, faculty, and staff,
I write to you with our weekly update from the COVID-19 Risk Assessment Group. We have highlighted essential points in yellow.
COVID-19 Vaccinations
Governor Kate Brown announced today an updated COVID-19 vaccination schedule. Critically for Reed, frontline workers as defined by CDC, including employees of colleges, are included in Group 7 that will become eligible for the vaccine no later than May 1. We recognize this is news to celebrate, but the news will also raise questions from community members. Since we just received this information today, it will take time for us to work through the answers. As we learn more, we will share information with the community. In the meantime, a helpful infographic regarding the updated schedule can be found here.
New Cases at Reed
Since our last update, we have identified two new confirmed COVID-19 cases at Reed. The cases were placed in isolation and a small number of potentially exposed individuals were contacted and quarantined promptly after the college's notification of the positive test results. We continue to report all associated COVID-19 cases online, found in the "Total Cases" section of the dashboard.
Updated Guidance on Events and Gatherings
This week, we updated our protocols for in-person gatherings and events on campus, following guidance from the Oregon Higher Education Coordinating Commission and Oregon Health Authority. You can review the updated guidance on our website here.
COVID & Title IX Amnesty
Students have asked questions about whether the college's Title IX/DHSM amnesty policies apply to violations of the COVID protocols. Amnesty will normally apply to these violations. A statement on sexual misconduct amnesty and COVID protocols is available on the Title IX website: https://www.reed.edu/title-ix/
Weekly Surveillance Testing Participation
This week, we conducted 1958 COVID-19 surveillance tests on campus. Students who live on campus had a participation rate of 93% while students who live off campus but access campus regularly had a participation rate of 89%.
Below, we've summarized this week's participation among on campus students by residence hall. A special shoutout goes to residents of Foster, Griffin, Chittick, and Woodbridge for achieving 100% participation this week, and congratulations to residents of Foster, our winners this week for displaying outstanding improvement in testing participation from previous weeks! Residents should hear from their Area Coordinator this week with instructions on how to claim a treat.
In order to best protect the Reed community, it is imperative that all community members participate in surveillance testing each week. For more information about the Reed COVID-19 surveillance testing program, please visit our website here.
Please help us keep Reed a safe place to live, work, and study by participating in surveillance testing, the weekly risk assessment survey, and, for those both local and remote, all other essential response measures on and off campus.
If you have questions, please don't hesitate to reach out to the COVID-19 Risk Assessment Group at coronavirusquestions@reed.edu.
Sincerely,
Madison Riethman, MPH, CPH
COVID-19 Response Coordinator and Health Project Manager
Health & Counseling Services
Reporting on behalf of the COVID-19 Risk Assessment Group
PS: As a reminder, you can track all our COVID-19 communications to members of the Reed Community here.