Five student athletes were inaccurately charged for Covid testing after presenting documentation of being fully vaccinated to the university in the fall semester. The students’ accounts have been corrected, and a new system of identifying athletes taking the tests has been put in place to prevent this issue in the future.
Unvaccinated student athletes must pay a $10 administration fee each time they take a Covid rapid test.
Covid testing protocol differs between institutions nationwide, but specific guidelines are mandatory for all participating within the NCAA. Updated guidelines state that both students and staff who are not “fully-vaccinated” must test three times a week during their competition season. According to NCAA, “fully vaccinated” includes people 14 days out of either the second dose of the Pfizer/Moderna vaccine or the initial shot of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, or those who have documented a positive test within the last 90 days.
With these guidelines, athletes who have not provided the university with documentation of being fully vaccinated are charged $10 a test, totaling $30 a week during competition season. Though the university receives the rapid tests at no cost, the $10 fee pays to hire off-campus administers of the tests. Student athletes were made aware of this throughout the fall 2021 semester. It wasn’t until the end of the fall semester that students started noticing inaccurate charges on their student accounts.
To take a Covid test, student athletes are expected to visit their athletic trainers’ office where an off-campus administrator hands over a rapid testing swab. The athlete signs their name for the off-campus administrator to verify the students’ identity before being sent outside to de-mask, swab their nose and return to complete the test kit. After 15 minutes, the administrator confirms the negative results and either sends the athlete out or starts the isolation process in the case of a positive result.
According to Karen Bontrager, Covid Steering Committee chair and director of the President’s Office, about five student athletes received the charges after other students’ signatures were inaccurately documented during their tests. The new system signs in students for testing using their student ID numbers as a way of preventing this issue from reoccurring, Bontrager said.
“Toward the end of the season I heard another teammate talking about how they had charges on their account for Covid tests they never took,” said an anonymous student athlete. “So, I was like, ‘Oh I should just check my account,’ because I never do that…and I go, and I check and I have charges for covid tests I never took.”
The student wishes to stay anonymous for fear of jeopardizing their athletic and educational career. They had been fully vaccinated before the start of the fall 2021 semester, meaning they should neither have been required to test nor have testing. The student was never notified that the charges had been added to their account. They reached out to the business office via email for reimbursement on Dec. 16 and were told the business office would contact the athletic department to verify the charges.
The student athlete saw no changes to their account at the start of spring semester and contacted the business office again on Jan. 18. As of Jan. 22, the charges had been removed from the student’s account.
If you find inaccurate covid testing charges on your student account contact the business office via email at cashier[at]bluffton.edu.
