Wondering how college students fared during the 2nd semester of remote classes? 85% of freshmen, sophomores, and juniors reported that the pandemic has negatively affected their grades during Fall 2020. The survey included 232 public and private colleges.
Seems that students weren’t happy with the quality of virtual learning, and some even stated that free resources like Khan Academy were more helpful than remote classwork. Yikes! Others suffered from mental health issues around academic changes and coronavirus fears.
With all of the uncertainty with testing, vaccines, distancing requirements, and general safety precautions taken on college campuses, this is not surprising. Not sure what the new normal will be for college students on campuses in the near future, but I’m sure everyone is going to be much more aware of how viruses spread and what students will need to do to protect themselves.
Wondering how college students fared during the 2nd semester of remote classes? 85% of freshmen, sophomores, and juniors reported that the pandemic has negatively affected their grades during Fall 2020. The survey included 232 public and private colleges.
Seems that students weren’t happy with the quality of virtual learning, and some even stated that free resources like Khan Academy were more helpful than remote classwork. Yikes! Others suffered from mental health issues around academic changes and coronavirus fears.
With all of the uncertainty with testing, vaccines, distancing requirements, and general safety precautions taken on college campuses, this is not surprising. Not sure what the new normal will be for college students on campuses in the near future, but I’m sure everyone is going to be much more aware of how viruses spread and what students will need to do to protect themselves.
I’ve had some interesting conversations about future expectations and plans with both young and old people. Now that we’re in our 4th month of shelter-in-place with new COVID-19 surges in half of the states, we’re really feeling the stress of the unknown. When can we see our families again? Will schools and colleges offer on-campus classes this school year? Will I ever go back to work again? How did this pandemic become so political that misinformation has become rampant? I’ve addressed these questions in past blogs.
Learning how to deal with pandemics may become part of the way we live our lives. All of the brides and grooms who have postponed their weddings and honeymoons for months are having to make difficult decisions about their nuptials and who they can invite. Guest lists have been stripped from 250 people down to 40. Church and restaurant venues are now being replaced with outdoor beach gatherings with social distancing. Grandparents and at-risk family and friends are watching the event on Zoom or Google Meet.
Deciding when or if they should have children has also become a serious conversation. Grandparents are missing opportunities to be there for baby arrivals and celebrations. Many 30-somethings are considering not having children – after all, should they bring babies into a world where pandemics isolate kids from family and friends? What about another real threat: climate crisis? While our climate problems have been sidelined as the world focuses on finding a vaccine for the coronavirus, we still need to reduce our CO2 and develop sustainable energy.
High school and college students are stressed as they make decisions about how to finance an online college experience and how far away from home they should go. Parents worry that their children may become infected by other students if they return to campus this fall, yet parents need to go to work and school has always been the place kids go during the day. If we knew that the coronavirus would be contained in 6 months, we could make plans and start living our lives. But this pandemic may take years to understand and eradicate.
70% of current college students (who took a survey) have lost income due to the recession caused by the coronavirus. 50% changed their living situations in the spring; and 25% dropped at least one course. Over 90% are concerned about their colleges shifting to online learning.
It’s time to rethink how we socialize, work, learn, and celebrate. We need to look ahead and make smart decisions. And, we need to do this as people, not political parties. It’s time to work together so we can move on.
History repeats itself. Plagues have wiped out millions of people every 100 years for 4 centuries. That’s why we trust facts and statistics. When we aren’t testing our 350 million US citizens, yet the government is talking about lifting the shelter-in-place orders based on economics and not the status of COVID-19, I am outraged and disillusioned.
My daughter Nicole (ER doc) just texted this to me:
“If the first wave of the Spanish Flu killed 3-5 million but the second wave killed 20-50 million, how are we going to handle the second wave?”
I told her that she shouldn’t be a hero when protestors are heading back to work, taking mass transportation, and ignoring the shelter-in-place orders. My friends and I have made 300 3-layered cloth masks with MERV-14 filters and 300 face shields to give every frontline worker in the Emergency Dept at her hospital the personal protection they can use when the second wave hits the Bay Area.
It sickens me to know that come fall 2020, my daughter and all of the healthcare workers in the United States and the world will face the second wave of this pandemic that will overwhelm them and probably kill 20-50 million people.
Why?
Because short-sighted people who run the government at the federal level and in many states don’t understand that by lifting the shelter-in-place order to get people back to work again BEFORE we’ve analyzed the spread of the virus and antibodies, we may experience an overwhelming resurgence of the coronavirus that will topple our economy and kill over 100 times more people in the process.
We need to listen to the medical professionals and stop listening to the politicians. Hunker down, simplify your life, and then come out to play and work when the coronavirus is contained and controlled.