What is the cause of all new Covid-19 cases in Notre Dame? Apparently it is the result of off campus partying.

As the world is enveloped by a global pandemic, education still strives to live on in the United States. Most universities have begun to reopen, to varying degrees of success. The University of Notre Dame allowed undergraduates to return to campus starting August tenth after a decrease of cases in Indiana.

Notre Dame is one of the first US colleges to reopen and be the first to see a large outbreak. Within the first week of school, 24% of the 8,500 undergraduates had confirmed cases of Covid-19. After this hopeful reopening, Notre Dame closed and switched all classes to online. Notre Dame’s Fighting Irish would also see its own problems as 24 members of their 94 member football team were put into quarantine, postponing the football season. This failure serves as a precaution to many schools in the US who are anxious to reopen. 

This story has made many schools, cautious and slow to reopen, in order to ensure that they do not escalate the number of cases. But this spike in cases is not primarily the fault of administration, but mainly those of the students. Notre Dame cites this massive spread not as the fault of their own, but that of off campus parties.

“I mean some people got sick early on and it was closed for two weeks, but then they reopened. It sounded like a lot of the problems for off-campus parties, which does not surprise me.” Commented Notre Dame alumnus and Prep math teacher Ms. Freeman. As Freeman stated Notre Dame had an impressive turn around and reopened to optional in person classes after there was a crack down on and a decline of college parties.

“There’s a lot of good kids and they realized if they followed the rules they would get to stay in University.” Responded Notre Dame alumni and science teacher, Ms. Matthews, when asked about the fast turn around in cases.

While the original opening has been widely criticized, the new protocols set in place have led to a dramatic decrease in the number of cases at Notre Dame.