NYU and Princeton move to cancel end-of-year events, hold exams online
School leaders at both New York University and Princeton University announced Wednesday that they will take steps to cancel end-of-year events and move winter exams online amid a surge in COVID-19 cases on their respective campuses.
"Given that we've seen an uptick in cases among undergraduates during the last 24 hours -- including suspected cases of the highly contagious Omicron variant -- we hope to avoid letting the final exam schedule interfere with students’ travel home for Winter Break," Princeton University's dean, Jill Dolan, and vice president for campus life, Rochelle Calhoun, said in a joint statement. "We certainly don’t want you remaining on campus in required isolation through the holidays."
All indoor gatherings with food and those where face coverings cannot be worn must be canceled or postponed at Princeton's New Jersey campus from Thursday through Jan. 7, according to the statement.
![](https://s.abcnews.com/images/US/princeton-campus-gty-ps-200706_hpEmbed_22x15_992.jpg)
A statement from New York University's provost, Katherine Fleming, executive Vice President, Martin Dorph, and head of the COVID-19 prevention and response team, Dr. Carlo Ciotoli, said they "strongly encourage that final examinations and/or assessments be changed to remote/online format." All discretionary, non-essential, non-academic gatherings and events at the school's campus in New York City must be canceled "immediately," according to the statement.
"The continuous review of the data from our COVID-19 testing program has indicated a considerable acceleration in the rate of new cases in our community," they said. "It’s not a cause for alarm, but it is a cause for concern, caution, and appropriate actions."
NYU has also joined a growing list of colleges and universities across the nation that are requiring all eligible members of the school community, including faculty and students, to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 and receive a booster shot ahead of the upcoming spring semester.
![](https://s.abcnews.com/images/US/nyu-campus-gty-ps-211215_1639586080159_hpEmbed_3x2_992.jpg)
Meanwhile, officials at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, announced Tuesday that they have moved the campus into a "level red" alert after identifying evidence of suspected cases of the omicron variant in a "significant" number of the school's COVID-19 positive samples from students.
According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the omicron variant is estimated to account for more than 13% of newly confirmed COVID-19 cases in the New York and New Jersey area -- the highest proportion of any region of the United States.
-ABC News' Chris Donato and Arielle Mitropoulos