If Marquette students come into contact with someone who has tested positive for the coronavirus, they are asked to isolate themselves by moving back to their place of residence or to an isolation area on or off-campus. One of the off-campus options is the Ambassador Hotel.
“A student would quarantine at The Ambassador if they have been in contact with a person testing positive closer than 6 ft, without a mask and for longer than 15 minutes,” Mary Janz, executive director of Housing and Residence Life, said in an email.
The Ambassador Hotel, located north of campus, has the capacity to hold 132 students in quarantine and is currently holding 37 students from Marquette, Janz said. It does not cost anything extra to isolate at the off-campus location. Those who are interested can still reserve rooms to stay in at the Ambassador through their website for an overnight stay.
Currently, the university has 35 quarantine and isolation rooms in total between both Mashuda Hall and Carpenter Tower according to Marquette’s coronavirus FAQ page. Students who live in singles are also given the option to quarantine in their own rooms if they are in a single with a private bathroom.
According to the university’s COVID-19 Dashboard, with the last gating criteria update on Friday, less than 50% of Marquette’s quarantine space is currently being used, which kept it in the “safe” criterion. It is unclear if the quarantine space includes the rooms at the Ambassador Hotel.
“The Ambassador was identified as a quarantine site early on when we were developing our Recovery Plan steps. Its use isn’t unique to this situation—it was always a planned quarantine site,” university spokesperson Chris Stolarski said in an email.
Stephen Petrus, a first-year student in the College of Engineering, had to relocate to the Ambassador after coming into contact with someone who tested positive at Wells Hall. He was escorted to the hotel to isolate there for the next two weeks starting Sept. 12 via Marquette’s LIMO.
“For the most part, it’s just me getting a lot of my work done,” Petrus said. “I’ve gotten pretty ahead in all my work for school.”
The person that Petrus had come into contact with originally was asked to quarantine at Mashuda after showing symptoms of the virus.
Petrus currently resides in a hotel room all by himself. He has his own bathroom and has meals delivered to him at noon for lunch and another at 5:30 p.m. for dinner. At that time, he also gets breakfast for the next day. An email is sent each week with a menu of what is available, as opposed to Schroeder Hall’s dining options which change on a daily basis.
“It’s basically all dorm food,” Petrus said. “It’s nothing too special.”
He was also tested for COVID-19 through the Marquette University Medical Clinic on Monday and got his results back two days late. Petrus tested negative, even after coming into close contact with someone who tested positive.
“I think it’s an efficient way to quarantine,” Petrus said. “If you’re able to remove students from their residence halls … you help prevent the spread of the coronavirus.”
Petrus is in the final 5 days of his quarantine and will be allowed to go back to Wells hall this Saturday.
This story was written by Benjamin Wells. He can be reached at [email protected].
