DES MOINES, Iowa — Editor's note: The video above was aired just before university officials released a new update regarding case numbers and information on how the rest of the semester will play out.
When May comes around, Drake students are usually prepping for finals. But this year, there's an extra tangle—a sudden uptick in COVID cases around campus.
Jessica Comstock is a senior at Drake; she's been dealing with COVID since her sophomore year.
"It's kind of been my whole college experience. So it's weird to even think that I don't know what it would have been like without it," she said.
With graduation less than two weeks away, COVID is rearing its head on campus one more time; Comstock tested positive for the virus shortly after the Drake Relays.
"Monday, I was still kind of sick. And I thought I should probably use one of these rapid tests I have lying around. And the line on my rapid test came up so fast," she said.
Comstock isn't alone; as of May 4, Drake has 255 confirmed cases of COVID in the student body. To put that into perspective, on April 29, just five days prior, there was only a single case. Sinjin Haase, another Drake senior who tested positive, said he felt confident going into Relays.
"I just kind of assumed everything was going to be fine because I had gone out to bars and everything this semester. I had no COVID scares, nothing like that. Everything was fine. So I didn't really have too many worries about it going into Relays," Haase said.
In an email to the student body, Drake President Marty Martin laid out the university's plan to help reduce the virus's spread. Martin encouraged students, staff, and faculty to wear masks on campus and said faculty are allowed to move courses online or require masks if they choose to. Pharmacy courses are remote through the end of the week. The goal is to make sure that seniors still get to have their commencement in person.
"Maybe there's enough cases where they actually have to move it online, which would suck. Because I was looking forward to actually having an in-person graduation ceremony and everything,' Haase said.
Comstock is in the same boat. She described how COVID "defined" her college years, and now, she's hoping that when graduation comes around, she won't be watching through a laptop screen.
"The world keeps spinning on. But I have a dress, I have my cap and gown. I'm ready. I'll be out of isolation by graduation," Comstock said.
Of the 255 cases, 75 are from students in campus housing, and the school encourages anyone not in isolation to move out of the dorms as soon as they can.
All remaining extracurricular events will be postponed, moved online, or canceled, depending on the decision of event organizers.
Drake still plans for an in-person commencement ceremony. The school will monitor COVID-19 data and share information about potential masking as the graduation date approaches.