UConn students, families cope with COVID quarantine

STORRS — University of Connecticut students and their families are coping with the COVID-19 outbreak on campus, where five more residents of a quarantined dorm tested positive Friday.

The university reported seven new cases — five of which are students who live in Garrigus Suites, where nearly 300 students have been quarantined since Thursday, when nine out of 10 new cases were reported there.

The university’s Storrs campus now has a total of 50 cases, an infection rate of 1 percent of its 5,000 students.

Garrigus students who tested positive have been moved to COVID-19 isolation beds reserved on campus, while the rest of the residents have been quarantined in their dorm.

The university said the quarantine will continue “until a clear decrease in transmission can be documented through serial testing. All residents in Garrigus will be tested twice a week, and there is an adjacent dining hall that will be open only to Garrigus residents during this quarantine period.”

Lisa Bologna, a Greenwich insurance agent whose son is among those quarantined in Garrigus, said students will find ways to adjust to the situation.

“The hope is, that as they continue to test the kids

who have been negative, that the numbers will go down and they will have contained it,” said Bologna, who said her son has a single room with his own bathroom. “And if you think about it, if they contain it in this scenario, they would have succeeded in

what they’re trying to do.”

Bologna, who also has a freshman attending UConn, said her children are “faring well” so far.

“I think as a parent, you worry about their isolation, especially if you have a freshman kid there,” she said. “They really are trying to do things to keep them connected virtually. My kids are fine, they’re faring well with it, and at

this point, I guess that’s all we can ask for. And as classes start, hopefully kids will just be occupying their time with school and activities that, for the most part, are online. Hopefully, they’ll be a little less bored in their rooms. And hopefully as things start to move along, they’ll be able to get out a bit.”

Gov. Ned Lamont said UConn’s rising cases and quarantined dorm will not impact the state’s back-toschool plans for grades K-12.

The affected students will be quarantined “and we’re going to work it through every day being aggressive as we can to see if we can keep these schools open safely.”

He said opening local school districts is safer in general because students and staff are coming “from a regional area where it’s a 1 percent infection rate.”

UConn freshman Katie Dattner moved into Buckley Hall Friday after being

quarantined when she arrived at school from Chicago as a precaution until she received a negative COVID-19 test.

Once she received her results, Dattner said she was able to spend time with her “family pod” — a small group of students who have tested negative and live in close proximity to her — in socially-distanced, outdoor activities, she said.

“We have a little bit more freedom than I expected,” Dattner said. “They’re really trying to socialize us as much as possible at a safe distance instead of keeping us cooped up in our rooms for 14 days — they’re letting us out a little bit, but in the safest way possible.”

She said the school’s coronavirus guidance has “been very clearly communicated, and I think the vast majority of people are following it.”

Back in Chicago, Dattner’s father, Derek, said he was concerned when he

heard about the quarantine at Garrigus Suites, “but unfortunately, this is not going to be the last time that this occurs.”

“They could very well do this to any number of dorms around campus,” he said. “But this also shows that they have a plan. That if something starts going bad, then they’re going to put a plan into action.”

In total, UConn’s Storrs campus has had 72 cases — 59 in students living at school and 13 from commuters. Yale University in New Haven has reported 74. Trinity College in Hartford has reported five cases.

Local school districts didn’t announce any major changes as a result of the positive cases at UConn, but some said they are waiting to see if there’s more guidance from the state.

In Trumbull, where officials worried they might not have enough teachers to reopen school, Interim Superintendent Ralph Iassogna said the schools “remain on track” to open on Sept. 8.

“There was a superintendents’ conference call, everybody is on hold waiting to see if the governor is going to have a revision or reaction to what’s happening (at UConn), but we are still on track for a hybrid learning model starting Sept. 8.”

He also said the school district’s staffing numbers are “trending in the right direction.”

Other schools are also relying on direction from the state.

“We’re continuing to operate based on our health and safety protocols,” Southern Connecticut State University spokesman Patrick Dilger said. “Any change in direction would come from the state, via the CSCU System Office.”

Staff writers Mark Zaretzky and Donald Eng contributed to this story.