Is Campus Life Back to Normal?

The welcome-back greetings from many colleges this fall had a common message: Life on campus is back to normal — despite another fall term taking place in the shadow of the pandemic.

For students eager to return to the social routines that were staples of college life before the pandemic began, campus event calendars show that many institutions have plenty of activities on deck.

Students can attend in-person career fairs, yoga classes, and film screenings. Seminars, block parties, and theater performances are back. So are trivia nights, wellness workshops, and art exhibits. And, of course, colleges are hosting fall sports, including football games that have been jam-packed with fans.

Yet despite the marked shift from last year’s virtual events to this year’s in-person ones at most colleges, life on campus hasn’t fully snapped back to 2019’s volume of offerings — and some mix of hybrid and virtual events seems like it’s here to stay.

To get a sense of what the decline and rebound look like, The Chronicle examined event calendars for six institutions: Irvine Valley College, Macalester College, Morgan State University, the University of Northern Iowa, the University of Texas at Austin, and Vanderbilt University.

We analyzed the first several weeks of the new academic year for 2019, 2020, and 2021. The colleges were selected for their varying geographic locations and distinct role within the sector — a community college, a small liberal-arts college, a historically Black university, a public regional university in a largely rural state, a public flagship, and a private research university.

Here’s a snapshot of student life at each one and how it changed:

Going Virtual and Staying There

In the first two months of the fall of 2020, student activities at Irvine Valley followed the same playbook as the one used for courses at the community college: They were all virtual.

A year later, in the fall of 2021, the college added some in-person classes to the mix. But a blend of formats for campus events didn’t follow suit, for the most part. Although the total number of events was up from the prior fall, just 13 percent of them were in person this August and September. What events could people physically attend? A 9/11 memorial ceremony, a financial-aid workshop, and men’s soccer matches.

Campus Events Per Week

In Person vs. Online

A Rebound From Last Fall

Macalester planned to begin the 2020-21 academic year in person while also providing a remote option for students who wanted one. But the college ultimately pivoted to a virtual environment, and new-student orientation, the class of 2024 talent show, and a digital escape room were among the 85 events held online last fall.

Fast forward to 2021, and the overall number of events in August and September is nearly the same as it was in 2019. And two thirds of them were in-person, including a bonfire to celebrate the new moon and foam-sword-fighting lessons followed by a mini-tournament.

Campus Events Per Week

In Person vs. Online

A Cautious Approach

In 2019 Morgan State had 174 events in August and September. A year later, the number of events fell by 37 percent and roughly three-fourths of them were held virtually as the college shifted many of its operations online. A “welcome back” ceremony at the university’s football stadium and a candlelight vigil for Breonna Taylor, whose death at the hands of the police spurred nationwide protests, were among the few in-person events.

This academic year, as Morgan State has reopened fully under a vaccine mandate for faculty, staff, and students, about one out of four events are still being held online, among them an improv night and a summit on the future of technology.

Campus Events Per Week

In Person vs. Online

Prioritizing In Person

Northern Iowa offered a wide range of things for students to do this fall. The number of events at the university rose 187 percent from 2020 to 2021, fueled by an extensive slate of activities this August to welcome new students to campus.

Of the events held this August and September, 94 percent were in person — save for a few training classes and workshops. Last fall , when a coronavirus vaccine was still being developed, 61 percent of events were in-person (the state’s Republican governor has generally favored relaxed public-health measures). Key among them: fraternity and sorority recruitment events. Online offerings that year included a fall volunteer fair, a study-abroad fair, and a mental-health conference.

Campus Events Per Week

In Person vs. Online

Between football, soccer, volleyball, and swimming, the University of Texas at Austin hosted 25 athletic match-ups in the first two months of the fall of 2019, a number that was roughly halved a year later during the pandemic. Other events at the university in the fall of 2020 fell sharply as well, to almost 500 activities — or about a third of what was offered in the year prior; nearly 75 percent of them were held virtually.

In the fall of 2021, however, athletics were back to 2019 levels. And the share of in-person and virtual events had basically flipped, although the overall number of events isn’t yet back to pre-pandemic levels. One in five events were still virtual, including “virtual speed friending,” a poetry reading, and multiple career-exploration discussions. Some in-person events from 2019 — a bootcamp on how to manage anxiety, a series of discussions about Marxism, and amateur radio-club meetings — didn’t resurface in 2020 or 2021.

Campus Events Per Week

In Person vs. Online

September 2019 was an activity-filled month at Vanderbilt, with 192 events on the books. That number held steady in September 2020 — with the vast majority held virtually — before rising 88 percent, to 360 total events in September 2021. New events included “Meditation Monday,” weekly meetings of the math club, a series of sessions on how to use the R programming language, and a student culinary society’s hot-chicken tasting.

This academic year, 69 percent of events in September were held in person. Among them: mentoring elementary-school students on campus, a discussion on how to succeed in science courses, and an undergraduate research science fair.

Campus Events Per Week

In Person vs. Online

The Chronicle’s analysis used the main university calendar published on each institution’s website. If home athletic events were not listed on the main calendar, they were compiled from each institution’s athletics page. The data were pulled the week of September 20, 2021, so some events and their in-person or virtual status may have been added, canceled, or edited after this date and would not be reflected in this analysis. Data represent events that took place between August 1 through September 30 of 2019, 2020, and 2021.

For each event, The Chronicle determined whether it was online or in person based on the listed event’s location or description. If locations were not listed or the description was inconclusive, the status of the meeting was left blank. If the event had any in-person component, it was considered in-person. For example, if a performance was in-person with a livestream, that would be considered an in-person event.

To more accurately capture the number of activities available to students, The Chronicle removed several types of events. For example, we removed about 3,000 events from the University of Texas at Austin’s calendar that were repeat calls for research participants for studies. For each institution, athletic events that were not home matches were removed. Events that took place in other cities and countries were also removed from the data set. Events that occurred over multiple days, such as exhibits at campus museums, were counted for each day that the event occurred. Duplicate events were removed where the title, date, time, and location were the same. Events solely for faculty and staff, such as faculty orientations, were also removed.