Keys college moves online and cancels student events until April 6 due to coronavirus scare

Although there have been no reported cases of coronavirus in the Florida Keys, the island chain’s community college will move classes online starting Monday and cancel all student activities and events through April 6.

Also, all employee travel is canceled through April 30, the College of the Florida Keys said.

CFK announced the changes Thursday, the day after the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a global pandemic.

“While there are no known cases of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) associated with CFK and the risk in Florida remains low, the college places the highest priority on the health and safety of employees and students,” CFK said on its website.

“As a result, CFK is implementing plans to prevent the potential spread of the disease at the College over the next three weeks following spring break,” the college said.

CFK, which has 1,200 students with its main campus located on Stock Island just north of Key West, has been on spring break this week.

Also Thursday, Saint Leo University said it will move to online classes “to avoid the spread of the novel coronavirus,” a spokeswoman said.

All classes taught on-site at Saint Leo education centers across Florida and the rest of the country will move online starting Monday, including the Key West Education Center located at Naval Air Station Key West on Boca Chica Key.

All public universities in Florida have been directed to transition all in-person classes to online platforms effective immediately, a precautionary step to mitigate the spread of the novel coronavirus.

The Florida Board of Governors, which presides over the 12 public universities in the State University System of Florida, made the sweeping announcement Wednesday hours after the World Health Organization’s declaration.

The CFK’s pool and the college dorm, Lagoon Landing, will remain open. Miami Dade College and Broward College are closing and moving toward online classes as well.

The Keys college announcement marked the first coronavirus-related major change along the island chain since the crisis started.

At the same time Thursday, the Marathon Seafood Festival announced the huge event was still going on as planned this weekend. The event is expected to draw a total of 20,000 to Marathon Community Park.

“We are still planning on holding our event this weekend,” said Daniel Samess, CEO of the Greater Marathon Chamber of Commerce in an email.

“We have convened with our [state] Department of Health and county emergency management, who at this point have assessed the risk as low due our event being outside, as well as all marine related and airports being open in the Keys,” Samess wrote.

This story was originally published March 12, 2020 at 2:18 PM.

Gwen Filosa

Miami Herald

Gwen Filosa covers Key West and the Lower Florida Keys for FLKeysNews.com and the Miami Herald and lives in Key West. She was part of the staff at the New Orleans Times-Picayune that in 2005 won two Pulitzer Prizes for coverage of Hurricane Katrina. She graduated from Indiana University.