The Daily Pennsylvanian spoke to five students — from Hong Kong, Sudan, China, and Australia — who are excited for in-person learning, but concerned about cases in the United States compared to the more limited spread in their home countries.&nbsp;

Delaney Parks

International students largely support in-person learning and Penn's COVID-19 mandates, but some want the University to implement more frequent testing and flexible learning options.&nbsp;
The Daily Pennsylvanian spoke to five students — from Hong Kong, Sudan, China, and Australia — who are excited for in-person learning, but concerned about <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/world/covid-cases.html" target="_blank">cases</a> in the United States compared to the more limited spread in their home countries.&nbsp;
Several students said there is a major difference in the attitudes toward COVID-19 displayed by people in their home countries compared to people in the United States.
Wearing a mask during flu season is a normal thing to do in Hong Kong, Helen Yeung, a junior from Hong Kong in the Jerome Fisher Program in Management and Technology, said, whereas she believes people in the United States do not view it that way. She added that while unmasking outdoors “makes sense to some extent,” most people in Hong Kong still wear masks, even outside. On campus, <a href="https://coronavirus.upenn.edu/content/public-health-guidance" target="_blank">masks are required </a>in all indoor public and shared spaces, but not for vaccinated individuals in outdoor spaces.
Similarly, Wharton junior Samir Thakore said that seeing people unmasked outdoors on campus was initially “a bit of a culture shock,” adding that students seem to have a very different mentality about getting COVID-19 than people do in Hong Kong.&nbsp;
“I think people here seem to be like, ‘If I get it, I get it. I'll live with it,’ so that's sort of the feeling I get from what I've seen so far,” Thakore said.&nbsp;
Thakore and Wharton junior Harry Hou both mentioned that they have friends in their home countries who are taking more serious precautions against COVID-19 — such as wearing two N95 masks in their classes — and who prefer virtual learning instead of being on campus.&nbsp;
“A lot of my friends who have been in China for the entire time [of the pandemic] and just came back [to the United States] recently, I know that they see this from a completely different perspective,” Hou said.&nbsp;
Unlike Yeung and Thakore's experiences in Hong Kong, Engineering junior Sarah Musa, who is from Sudan, said that she was often one of the only people wearing a mask when she was in Sudan during the summer. The country experiences regular <a href="https://www.dabangasudan.org/en/all-news/article/covid-19-spikes-in-sudan-s-red-sea-state-call-for-lockdown-curfew" target="_blank">spikes</a> as a result of this, so Musa, along with the other students, said they appreciated Penn's masking mandates.
Since the resumption of in-person learning, Penn faculty members and administrators have been involved in an ongoing dialogue about virtual options and COVID-19 safety.&nbsp;
This semester, classes are primarily in person, <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2021/09/penn-professors-virtual-instruction-during-in-person-fall-2021-semester-covid" target="_blank">with a few exceptions because of departmental decisions and medical exemptions.</a> Instructors who qualify for an exemption from in-person teaching have the option to request a medical accommodation through the <a href="https://oaaeop.upenn.edu/home" target="_blank">Office of Affirmative Action and Equal Opportunity Programs</a>. Faculty members with non-medical reasons, such as an immunocompromised family member, can also request accommodations from their department chair or dean.&nbsp;
<a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2021/09/penn-faculty-instructor-petition-covid-fall-semester" target="_blank">225 instructors recently petitioned Penn</a> to allow faculty to make their own decisions about remote learning, citing concerns about a lack of social distancing and air circulation and instructors with unvaccinated family members. ​​Additionally, on Sept. 11, <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2021/09/penn-aaup-faculty-expectations-covid-19-safety" target="_blank">Penn's chapter of the American Association of University Professors</a> sent a list of COVID-19 safety recommendations to administrators that included giving faculty the option to teach online –&nbsp;but the University has not budged.&nbsp;
Most of the students &nbsp;believe the University could increase the frequency of mandated COVID-19 testing for the Penn community, expressing concern about an increasing number of sick students still attending class.&nbsp;
The University requires students to get tested <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2021/08/penn-announcement-twice-a-week-testing-covid-fall-2021" target="_blank">twice a month</a> and to complete the daily PennOpen Pass symptom checks.
Thakore said Penn should require weekly testing because some students may be infected and recover without ever knowing about it, contributing to asymptomatic spread on campus.&nbsp;
Yeung similarly said that more frequent testing, especially for students who may have been in “risky places” or in contact with someone who has COVID-19, could be helpful in containing a potential outbreak.&nbsp;
On the other hand, College senior Yiwei Chai said that because of high vaccination rates on campus, she believes that Penn is not testing “too infrequently.” Currently, <a href="https://coronavirus.upenn.edu/content/dashboard" target="_blank">97%</a> of Penn undergraduate students and faculty are vaccinated.
Yeung and Thakore said Penn's mask mandate and high vaccination rates are helpful in lessening COVID-19-related concerns, but they worry that transmission rates can increase if students with flu-like symptoms continue coming to class.&nbsp;
“Emotionally, there's definitely excitement, but then hygiene-wise, I was pretty concerned,” Yeung said. &nbsp;
Due to these concerns, Hou said he thinks the University has to balance the in-person experience with pandemic precautions.
“Penn, as an institution, should prioritize students, obviously," Hou said. "On one hand, everyone obviously wants a more in-person experience. That's what you signed up for. But on the other hand, COVID-19 is still very much a real thing."
Coming from Australia, Chai said she likes in-person classes but still finds it “a little bizarre” that her classrooms do not enforce social distancing guidelines.
Musa, who was grateful to get <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/penn-covid-vaccine-philadelphia-vaccine-students" target="_blank">vaccinated at Penn during the spring 2021 semester</a>, especially given that vaccine supply was limited in Sudan, said she is still worried about classmates who are not as careful about COVID-19 as she is.
“There's always the case of, is everyone else going to be as safe as I will be?” Musa said.&nbsp;
After witnessing their own friends from back home follow more stringent COVID-19 precautions, some of the international students, particularly Thakore, support virtual learning options alongside in-person classes.&nbsp;
Chai believes administrators should be more flexible with professors who have COVID-19-related issues and have to move class online, citing how one of her professors had difficulty getting permission to temporarily switch class to online after getting a red PennOpen Pass.
Thakore voiced support for instructors having the option to teach online as well, saying that older professors and instructors with young children should be given the option to teach online throughout the semester. He's hopeful that cases will stay under control and that in-person classes will continue, but said he is prepared for the worst case scenario of increased transmission and the transition of classes to online.
“I just hope that cases stay manageable, and things can continue, but I honestly wouldn't be surprised if they don't,” Thakore said.

Gundappa Saha

09-13-21 Campus Locust Walk Masks COVID-19 (Gundappa Saha).jpg

Weaker U.S. outdoor mask mandates were ‘culture shocks’ to some international students

After having adapted their instruction methods for the last year and a half, many of these professors said those changes are here to stay — at least for now.

Komal Patel

Despite Penn's decision to resume an in-person semester, some professors are teaching virtually this fall due to health concerns and departmental decisions. &nbsp;
Professors who are teaching virtually are adding more hybrid opportunities for student support,&nbsp;such as additional online office hours and in-person recitations. After having adapted their instruction methods for the last year and a half, many of these professors said those changes are here to stay — at least for now.
Immediately upon learning of the University's <a href="https://coronavirus.upenn.edu/announcement/update-penn%E2%80%99s-plans-fall-semester" target="_blank">plans for in-person classes</a> in April, Statistics and Data Science professor Paul Shaman said he got permission from his department chair to teach his classes virtually due to personal COVID-19-related health concerns.&nbsp;
Faculty members who qualify for an exemption from in-person teaching this fall can request a medical accommodation through the <a href="https://oaaeop.upenn.edu/home" target="_blank">Office of Affirmative Action and Equal Opportunity Programs</a>, and instructors who need an exemption for non-medical reasons, such as an at-risk family member, can request an accommodation from a department chair or dean. Still, more than 225 instructors are <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2021/09/penn-faculty-instructor-petition-covid-fall-semester" target="_blank">petitioning the University</a> for the ability to make their own choices regarding class formats, even as administrators remain firm on their commitment to provide an in-person experience this fall.&nbsp;
Shaman is teaching one undergraduate course – "Forecasting Methods for Management," cross-listed as STAT 435, STAT 711, and STAT 535 — and one graduate level course — STAT 520: "Applied Econometrics I" — virtually. The cross-listed course has a maximum enrollment of 130 students, while the in-person class would have been capped at 75 students.
Shaman said he actually has more contact with students now than he did during in-person classes before the pandemic.&nbsp;
"I'm giving separate office hours for the two classes, whereas when I was on campus, I would have one set of office hours and students from both classes would come," he explained.&nbsp;
Shaman said his classes are synchronous but recordings are made available to students afterward — which, he said, means that students can access them multiple times if they want to review or attend a class they would otherwise miss.&nbsp;
​​”It's very, very convenient,” Shaman said. “As long as the students are accepting of it, that's fine. I will add that some students have told me that they prefer online; it gives them more flexibility.”
Shaman is not alone in seeing benefits for virtual instruction.&nbsp;
Deirdre Martinez, the director of the semester-long <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2020/06/penn-washington-online-coronavirus-fall-remote-online-classes-internship" target="_blank">Penn in Washington Program,</a> has found ways to incorporate pandemic-inspired virtual instruction into her in-person course this fall, PSCI 398: "The Future of Conservatism and the GOP." Martinez said she is co-teaching the course with Evan McMullin, a 2011 Wharton MBA alumnus, who uses Zoom to tune into classes from Utah.
“Of course, [there’s] great value to being in a room together. But we're taking what we learned from when we did have to pivot to remote learning," Martinez said. "I think we can really enrich the learning experience with it."&nbsp;
Using Zoom in the classroom has made it possible to invite more guest speakers than ever before, Martinez said. Similar to other professors, Martinez added that the technologies that academics have now become familiar with will be a positive tool in the future.&nbsp;
“I don't know what the post-COVID-19 world is really going to look like,” Martinez said. “But I do think, in this case, you would never have been able to get dozens of the most important people talking about and thinking about the future of the Republican Party to talk to the students in one class on campus. We do that all the time in D.C., because they're physically there.” &nbsp;
Other instructors were told by their respective departments and school administrators to teach online this semester. &nbsp;
Organic Chemistry lecturer Alyssa Bohen is teaching two courses, CHEM 244 and CHEM 249, with an in-person lab component and an online asynchronous lecture. She said the accessibility of online lectures is helpful, and wrote in an email to The Daily Pennsylvanian that the recordings can be an asset with difficult topics because students can rewatch them.&nbsp;
Bohen added that while students have appreciated the online lectures, they seem excited to get back to in-person lab work.&nbsp;
For statistics professor Warren Ewens, the decision to teach online was made by “higher-ups" in the Wharton School, he said. As a result, Ewens is teaching STAT 111: "Introductory Statistics" asynchronously this semester with in-person recitations and two virtual sections that each have about 150 students.
About 10 other courses <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2021/08/penn-fall-2021-class-formats-covid-virtual-in-person" target="_blank">across the College, Penn Nursing, and the Wharton School</a> have also been online since the beginning of the semester.
Ewens believes the reason for the University's decision to keep his class virtual may have been partly due to the large class size, which could cause some students in the back of the lecture to struggle to hear him speaking through a mask. Ewens said he’s heard that some professors have been struggling with projecting and being heard through masks.
Some students <a href="https://www.thedp.com/article/2021/09/penn-nso-first-year-sophomore-in-person-transition-covid-classes-review" target="_blank">have also recently told the DP</a> they've experienced COVID-19-related struggles in classes, like soft-spoken professors wearing two masks and a recitation being held online with poor connection, even though they overall said they're enjoying in-person learning.&nbsp;
Like Shaman, Ewens believes the recorded format is more convenient and that the lectures end up being shorter and more concise, but he added that there’s “definitely something lacking” when it comes to forming closer connections with students and answering their questions in class. In-person instruction is also less scripted and influenced more by the questions students ask, he said, comparing virtual instruction to a TV performance.&nbsp;
“You miss the interaction with the students,” Ewens said, adding that it can be difficult to gauge students' understanding of the material in a remote setting.
“With an in-person class, if you're trying to explain some point, and you look at the faces of the students in the class, you can usually tell whether they understood that point if their faces light up, or something like that," Ewens said. "Of course, that's not possible in a recorded lecture."

Sukhmani Kaur

An empty classroom in Meyerson Hall on March 11, 2020.

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