Coronavirus

Increase in discrimination against Chinese students, mistreatment of a Tilburg student and teachers who refuse students from ‘corona area’. In this timeline you can read about the consequences of the spread of the coronavirus for Erasmus University and in higher education.

The spread of the coronavirus does not make the university decide to take additional measures for the time being, the university announced on 29 January 2020. The university does, however, advice students and staff coming from China to the Netherlands or traveling from the Netherlands to China to monitor the sites of the Dutch government and the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) for advice.

31 January: Erasmus University temporarily forbids its employees to travel to China and urgently discourages students to do so. The Executive Board (CvB) of the university has decided this based on the stricter travel advice from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs following the spread of the coronavirus.

5 February: What does it mean when your family is stuck in Wuhan? Shihui Liu is a post-master’s student in Maritime Economics and Logistics at Erasmus University and is, as far as she knows, the only EUR student who comes from the city that is ravaged by the coronavirus.

6 February: Professor of virology Marion Koopmans investigates the outbreak and control of the coronavirus: “At SARS it was still a ten-year plan. Now we must succeed in making a working vaccine within four or five months.”

Discrimination against Chinese students in Rotterdam is increasing, says CSA-EUR chairman Jingli Gao on the 11th of February. Since the beginning of the coronavirus news he has felt less safe in the street.

26 February: In the event of a possible corona crisis in the Netherlands, Erasmus University will follow the instructions of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and RIVM. Universities in the north of Italy are now closed due to the outbreak of the coronavirus. The same could happen here should the virus spread to the Netherlands. “Of course, we have contingency plans ready for use.

26 February: A student from Tilburg University was abused in a student complex on Saturday night. She was attacked by a group of men after she asked them to stop singing a carnival song about the coronavirus.

A number of lecturers have considered refusing students who recently visited a corona area to their lectures and classes, turns out on the 27th of February. Hans Smits is worried about the ‘sentiment and the emotions’ surrounding the coronavirus. And as Board Chair, he emphasizes that turning away students is not an option.

On the 28th of February, two people in the Netherlands are infected with the coronavirus. Marion Koopmans, head of the Virology department at Erasmus MC, explained on Tuesday evening (when there were no infections yet) in Studio Erasmus what happens in an infection case.

On Friday 6 March, student association CSA organised a seminar on the increased discrimination against people of Asian origin. About 20 people attended the meeting in the Erasmus Pavilion.

On 9 March, stock prices worldwide fell sharply. Student association B&R Beurs, however, anticipated that the coronavirus would have an impact on stock prices, so the students had sold their shares on time. The students did not expect the corona epidemic to coincide with a price war on the oil market.

The corona epidemic is also having consequences for education at the medical faculty. From Friday 13 March, Erasmus MC will no longer be teaching groups of more than thirty students. Education involving physical contact will also be discontinued.

The corona liveblog for Tuesday, 17 March about a new way of taking digital exams, Erasmus TV about the Binding Study Advice and playing tennis as the ultimate social distancing activity.