Northeastern lifts some COVID-19 restrictions

BOSTON — Northeastern University announced in an email to students and staff that it plans to start lifting its COVID-19 restrictions across all of its North American campuses.

On Tuesday, an email was sent out from Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs David Madigan and Chancellor and Senior Vice President for Learning Ken Henderson, informing students and faculty that the university will start reversing three policies.

These policies include the ban on non-Northeastern guests in residence halls, restrictions on events and gatherings, and university-sponsored travel restrictions.

“Northeastern is a fully vaccinated community with a booster requirement,” the email said. “Given the effectiveness of the vaccines, and the significant reduction in cases across North America, we are pleased to announce the lifting of restrictions across all of our North American campuses.”

Non-Northeastern guests entering residence halls can only enter if they are compliant with the university’s masking requirements, vaccination mandate, and housing and residential life’s pre-COVID-19 policies, the university said.

University officials did confirm that the school plans to maintain indoor mask requirements and weekly asymptomatic testing while monitoring developments.

For more information, the email said students can refer to Northeastern’s online resources or submit questions to NUCOVID19Qs@northeastern.edu.

University leaders said they’re evaluating potential changes to testing that could take effect later in the Spring Semester.

“We hear upperclassmen talk about how fun student life was previous to COVID. I think this will be nice,” said Northeastern freshman Kayla Keddo.

Boston 25 News reached out to more than a dozen colleges and universities in the Boston area following Northeastern’s announcement.

Some, including Simmons, said they had no plans for any changes.

Tufts University released the following statement:

“Throughout the pandemic, we have taken a data-driven approach to our decision making and have focused on flexibly adjusting our policies accordingly, with our top priority being the health and safety of our university community and our neighbors. Our most recent relaxation of guidelines (about a week ago, permitting in-person dining, visitors on campus, in-person events, spectators, and opening the fitness center) is a reflection of the encouraging data we are seeing, which indicate that the surge is waning. Combined with the facts that the university has a highly vaccinated population and that we continue to conduct surveillance testing, we are moving in a promising direction and are hopeful that we will be able to continue to relax our policies in the weeks to come.”

Emerson College shared the following changes that took effect on its campus on Monday:

Non-Emerson guests will now be permitted to enter Emerson College spaces (non-residential) for academic related purposes and after being registered in our iVisitor system by an Emerson faculty or staff host
Food will now be allowed for events that are approved to take place in campus spaces. Please continue to take proper precautions to limit the amount of time guests are unmasked to limit any potential spread of virus.
The Dining Center and other dining facilities will return to normal operations and capacities. Masks should only be removed when actively eating or drinking at a table. The Grab-and-Go option still remains.
Spectators will be permitted to attend athletic events and must follow the College’s policies for the event, including remaining masked at all times.

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