UCSD is still largely a ghost town as return of in-person classes hits a snag

UC San Diego’s hopes of regaining a sense of normalcy with this week’s return of in-person classes is turning out to be a disappointment.

The school, which has nearly 43,000 students, disclosed Wednesday that it is keeping 29 percent of its undergraduate course sections fully online for the remainder of the winter quarter, which ends on March 19. And it appears that students will be able to take at least parts of many other classes remotely as some professors offer a hybrid format.

The next steps are not clear. Dr. Robert Schooley, who has been guiding UCSD’s efforts to open the campus more widely, declined to discuss the situation.

But there’s no mistaking the school’s ghostly appearance since Jan. 3, when UCSD, like other University of California campuses, began the quarter almost entirely online due to the spread of the Omicron variant of the coronavirus.

That’s a throwback to the first days of the pandemic in 2020, when UCSD and other schools went virtual for the first time. Improving infection rates led to mostly in-person instruction in the fall quarter, and UCSD celebrated and dealt with record enrollment.

Geisel Library is normally a mob scene during mid-term exams, which are underway right now. But an online app that monitors foot traffic in campus buildings said the library was “not busy” through noon on Wednesday. Things later got much livelier later in parts of the library. Many common gathering places, such as eateries, also weren’t busy.

There was little foot traffic at noon Tuesday in UCSD’s normally busy engineering quad.

(Gary Robbins / The San Diego Union-Tribune )

Much of the student union appeared deserted during the lunch hour a day earlier. And there are reports that in-person attendance is low in some classes.

“I had a political science class on Wednesday that enrolled 80 students, but only 20 showed up,” said Manu Agni, an urban planning major and president of Associated Students, which represents the student body.

“I knew that the faculty had been given the option to teach online, or do hybrids. But I was not led to believe this would happen. It’s like a half-return to campus, or a lower-case return. It’s a bummer.”

The situation didn’t surprise Katie Nugent, who majors in human biology.

“A lot of students don’t feel comfortable yet going to a classroom because of COVID, and they like the convenience of studying online,” Nugent said Wednesday. “You can’t beat that in these difficult times.”

Many schools are struggling to navigate their way through the pandemic.

On Monday, a group of UCLA students staged a sit-in outside the office of Chancellor Gene Block, where they demanded more online-learning options.

The protest occurred as University of California campuses were resuming in-person classes after spending the first four weeks of the year mostly online.

There also has been a lot of frustration at San Diego State University, where some students have been complaining about efforts by the campus to get them to attend basketball games while delaying the return of in-person classes until February 7.

The complaints came even though people who attend the games must be vaccinated or show proof of a recent negative COVID-19 test.

“(The ticket offer) makes absolutely no sense to me,” student Julia Ng told the Daily Aztec, SDSU’s student newspaper.

“I think it is maybe hypocritical in a way that the school is only hosting events like specifically sporting events where they are able to profit from those while our classes are virtual and we are still paying full tuition for that.”

Students are experiencing the same blend of exasperation and exhaustion that began in March 2020 when the rise of COVID-19 forced most of the nation’s universities to rapidly move most students out of campus housing and to shift most classes online.

The tension eased a lot in September 2021 when schools like UCSD and SDSU resumed mostly in-person instruction as the pandemic ebbed. But the rapid rise of Omicron upended things, pushing instruction back online.

UCSD, the largest university south of Los Angeles, reported this week that it has 15,844 students living in university housing. Meanwhile, the school’s infection rate among students stood at 2.82 percent. The figure was nearly 10 percent in early January. But it’s still above where it was most of last year, when 0.19 percent was a common reading.

“Students really want to get out and socialize, but they’re staying in their rooms with their friends,” said Nugent, a senior. “Loneliness really is an issue right now.

“I can’t complain because the university has been doing its best to make safety decisions that follows science. No one wants another COVID spike that leads to another shut down. It does bum me out that my college years are ending this way.”