News Talk 94.1/AM 1600 Where The Upper Cumberland Talks
Tennessee Tech has reported over 200 active COVID cases among students for seven days straight.
The university currently has 267 active cases with the majority being off-campus students. Chief Communication Officer Karen Lykins said the numbers follow state trends.
“We realized that we returned to campus one to two weeks earlier than most schools,” Lykins said. “So when you compare with others in the state, that predicted cycle of cases rising came earlier here because we started earlier than it did at other campuses across the state. I think you’ll be seeing similar patterns as they catch up.”
The case numbers have been the highest reported since Tech began its COVID dashboard last year. Lykins said the numbers have not impacted class attendance with about 90 percent of students participating academically.
“For the first two weeks, our attendance numbers have still been relatively high,” Lykins said.”So between 85 and 90 percent of our students are still attending class. This means that we haven’t yet hit a high absence rate that would concern us and show us that this is something we would need to respond to differently.”
Lykins said a high absence rate would cause concern for the university. Lykins said the plan at this time is to stay in person.
