COVID-19 and Higher Ed: Biweekly Update
Updates from New England Institutions
Check out NEBHE's COVID-19 updated dashboard for complete data
HEIs' plans for fall curriculum delivery
  • Fully Online Delivery: 46
  • Fully On-Campus Delivery: 51
  • Dual Delivery: 107 

Housing Protocol for Residential Campuses:
  • Regular Housing Options Available: 59
  • Reduced Housing for a Limited Number of Students: 48
  • No Housing Available: 7
Data in the Time of COVID-19: How New England's Campuses are Monitoring the Spread of the Coronavirus and Promoting Transparency
As many students begin returning to New England's college campuses, colleges are leveraging data dashboards to monitor the spread of COVID-19 among students and staff and promote transparency. Information published often includes the number of tests performed, positivity rates, number of students in isolation, etc. As the pandemic wears on, these tools will continue to be critical in understanding the impact of COVID-19 on higher education in New England.

At the beginning of this week, twelve COVID-19 dashboards had been launched across the region. As of today, that number has jumped to fifty.
Public-facing COVID-19 data dashboards at New England HEIs and Systems
(hyperlinked; institutions listed in alphabetical order)

Notably, the college's site shows how the campus' positivity rate compares to that of Worcester County and the state of Massachusetts.

Bates College began tracking epidemiological and healthcare resource metrics on August 18. The resource incorporates information on case counts among students and faculty, testing, isolation housing.



Bowdoin's dashboard is updated everyday, Monday through Friday, based on the previous day's data. The resource displays data on students, as well as for faculty and staff.



The Healthy Clark Dashboard tracks COVID-19 cases and testing daily on the Clark University campus and in Worcester, MA. The dashboard is updated daily by 8:00 p.m. with the most recent information available.

Unlike most other institutions' trackers, Colby's monitors additional helpful information, including number of positive cases that have recovered, number of inconclusive tests, and the campus' operational level.




The resource provides three main categories of information: testing, results, and quarantine/isolation/hospitalization. Baseline and weekly testing began on August 7 and will continue throughout the fall term.

Harvard's dashboard — one of the most comprehensive in New England — reports the results of regular screening. The data is relative to only people authorized to return to campus and not the entire Harvard community, most of which is still remote. Going forward, Harvard will further refine its dashboard to continue to share additional information as their data availability expands.





Perhaps unsurprisingly, MIT has developed a high quality dashboard. Although simple, it conveys aggregate daily, weekly, and monthly information about the number of tests conducted and positivity rates.






Quinnipiac, along with its dashboard, has also introduced a symptom checker app to keep the campus community safe.


The Roger Williams Data Hub is part of the university's wider "Reopening Roger" initiative. The detailed dashboard allows users to filter results by location (Bristol undergraduate and graduate, Providence campus, and RWU School of Law) and connects individuals to the university's quarantine and isolation procedures for both students and staff.






Tufts has launched one of the most detailed dashboards in the region. Helpfully, it breaks down the data by campus, by type of person (i.e., student, faculty, affiliate, or staff), shows how many tests are currently pending, and how many are deemed "invalid."

Unlike most other institutions' dashboards, the one released by UMass Amherst shows seven-day test averages.



Systemwide information released includes known cases to date, number of tests administered, and asymptomatic positive results.


UNH's tracker provides a detailed snapshot that is updated every few days. It breaks down the numbers by campus, as well as by population (student, faculty, staff, contractor, other).


URI's dashboard is particularly helpful in that it presents the information in a way that is clear and easy to read.



A quite informative dashboard, it tracks on-campus health relative to the City of Worcester.



Does your institution have a publicly available COVID-19 dashboard that we didn't capture here? Let us know! Email smurphy@nebhe.org.

For more, visit NEBHE's COVID-19 Resource Page
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