From grade school to graduate school, developing young minds in close physical proximity halted abruptly in mid-March 2020.
What happened next to schools and families was devastating and electrifying, thought-provoking and quieting, unifying and isolating. Homes became entire worlds. Working parents juggled daytime teaching. College students studied from childhood bedrooms. Millions of kindergarteners started school in a format previously unfathomable: on Zoom.
Teachers shifted to nurturing and encouraging through screens — with little training. Many hunted down students in person to ensure they were safe, fed and outfitted with resources to learn.
The COVID-19 pandemic has presented a set of real-world lessons too close and too fresh to be captured by textbooks: How does one manage lives lost? Calculate the damage of lost income? Measure new levels of mental fatigue? We interviewed more than 30 students and educators, of all ages and experience, about how they grew and changed in 2020 — or just made it to the next day.
On the anniversary of this extraordinary year, here’s what they learned.
What surprised you the most about virtual or hybrid learning?
Students discuss what surprised them most about hybrid learning
Students and educators describe the most difficult part of school
Students and educators explain their source of strength this past year
Students and how they have maintained relationships amidst COVID-19
Students and educators describe what they have learned this past year
Students describe the most challenging part of their personal lives
Students and educators reflect on stories they'll tell in 20 years
“The mask environment — having to teach through that, having to work with students through that and communicate through this barrier was a struggle. I couldn’t quite tell if they were getting it. My dad jokes just didn’t land.” — Josh Montgomery, 43, associate professor of computer science at Southern State Community College in Hillsboro, Ohio
When personal protective equipment was scarce at the beginning of the pandemic, Montgomery organized about 200 volunteers, most of them local educators, to create and assemble face shields for first responders. With the help of 3D printers, the educators distributed more than 4,000 face masks to 51 medical organizations.
Alvizo has attended her dual-enrollment high school remotely all year from the three-bedroom, one bathroom home she shares with 10 family members. Her father and grandmother got very sick with COVID-19, but both have recovered. Alvizo, the first in her family to attend college, participates in the Boys & Girls Clubs’ College Bound program. She’ll graduate high school with two associate degrees and plans to continue studying to be a physician’s assistant.
Alvarez, a DACA student, said neither she nor her family received relief money from the CARES Act. Undocumented communities were not eligible. But different organizations at the university raised funds for them, Alvarez said.
"What surprised me most about virtual learning is probably how exhausting it is. And I don't just mean exhausting in the physical sense or your eye-strain sense, which are all very real. I also mean exhausting in the sense that you are reimagining yourself every day, and you are sitting in this place trying to figure out how to really teach this material to students who sometimes don't have their cameras on." — Joellen Persad, 29, physics teacher, Madison Park Technical Vocational High School, Boston.
Students and educators discuss what surprised them the most about virtual and hybrid learning.
Harrison Hill, USA TODAY
Carda and the Creighton Blue Jays were in the middle of the Big East conference tournament when COVID-19 shut down college sports. She flew home to Minnesota, where she stayed for six months. Carda played all season wearing a mask.
“I’m fueled by being around people, by touching them – like, I'm going to physically demonstrate my affection towards you. When I'm with my kids, I'm like, ‘let’s hug!’ ” I have seen some of my students who have come into the building, but I feel this pause, like, ‘Oh, I need to make sure I keep my space and stay over here.’ And that's been really, really tough.” — Joellen Persad, 29, physics teacher, Boston
“When my wife got sick, that was very scary. I had four members of my family die from COVID.” — Aaron Jemison, 54, custodian, Peterson Elementary School, Chicago
Jemison contracted the virus and was hospitalized on March 22 last year. He and his wife have recovered, and Jemison is back at work. About 300 students at Peterson are receiving in-person instruction, he said.
Koch is currently studying online from Frieda, Germany. Without access to university libraries for studying, Koch said she feels like she's lost at least a year of her PhD work.
“In my first year of teaching, I taught a group of students on Sept. 11, and I thought for years and years that would be the hardest day. I’m in Littleton, Colorado, so we have experienced a couple of local school shootings since that, and I thought those would be the hardest days. Those days were very hard, but in some ways they were contained. This has been 12 months of crisis.” — Monica Fuglei, 44, community college instructor and English department chair, Arapahoe Community College, Littleton, Colorado
Students and educators describe the most difficult part of the past school year
Harrison Hill, USA TODAY
Miles was released from Texas Youth Commission, a juvenile correctional facility, at the end of March 2020. He served time for having drugs on a school campus. Eight Million Stories, a nonprofit that helps disadvantaged youth, helped him finish his education. He plans to attend Alabama A&M University this fall.
Fillingin’s wife, also a student at Eastern Washington University, is due in July. They're both attending classes online from her family's home in Tacoma, Washington. Their wedding last summer was reduced to five guests. Fillingin said he lost several thousand dollars in deposits.
“The most difficult part of my home or social life was having no privacy. Usually during the year, I could go out and find my own space. Being home all day with 10 other family members is stressful. There’s a lot of arguments. You’re together all the time and then you start to feel unappreciated, which is ironic.” — Cristina Alvizo, 17, Middle College High School, Santa Ana, California.
When Alvizo’s father came back from the hospital to recover from COVID-19, Alvizo, her mom, and her sister who share the room had to sleep in the living room floor for several weeks. Alvizo continued to attend class from home and also help her little sister attend kindergarten on Zoom.
Students and educators describe the most challenging part of their personal lives since the coronavirus pandemic shifted their lives
Harrison Hill, USA TODAY
Bradley chose to homeschool this year, but she feared missing all the rituals that would make her feel like a senior. In the end, she said, it turned out to be a good decision.
Gregory was on the 50th day of his new job leading Hillside when schools shut down. Initially, many students lacked internet and computers at home, but as those needs were addressed, and as local COVID-19 transmission rates remained high, Gregory announced the district would continue operating online for the entire 2020-21 school year.
Students and educators discuss where they found strength this past year
Harrison Hill, USA TODAY
Williams-Hall’s son just went to college. She normally would have dealt with the loneliness and isolation by chatting with colleagues at school in the hallways or at lunchtime, she said.
“My friends at the Teachers College and I would hold Zoom calls where we would work on our assignments together. This became more frequent during the finals and all of our projects due. It was the moral support that we felt from having another person’s presence, even though it was virtual. I remember staying up till 3 a.m. working on a final project with one of my other friends.” — Denis Alvarez, 22, senior at Arizona State University.
Students and educators from schools across the nation discuss how they have maintained relationships this past year amidst the coronavirus pandemic.
Harrison Hill, USA TODAY
Green learned a difficult truth this year: His great-great grandfather was a slave. Still, he appreciated the time at home to discuss his family’s history with loved ones, he said.
“(The pandemic) made that superintendent/ed-leader network stronger, because we didn’t have mandates and guidance. I have colleagues that are superintendents out in Washington State, who were a few weeks ahead of me when we were talking about shutting down here in Ohio. I said, ‘What am I not thinking of?’ ‘What don’t I know?’ ‘What do you wish you would have known when you started down this path a couple of weeks ago?’ ” — Matt Miller, 49, superintendent and CEO, Lakota Local Schools, Ohio
“I never realized how big of a disparity the digital divide is in certain communities. Things we take for granted, like access to the internet, isn't there for everyone. Or if there’s an older sibling in the home, they have to watch a younger sibling and at times have to share a device. It was that digital divide that I was not anticipating. It destroyed us last spring.” — Robert Gregory, 47, Hillside Public Schools, Hillside, New Jersey.
Students and educators describe what they have learned this year that they wouldn't have learned without the pandemic
Harrison Hill, USA TODAY
“Everything is not pencil, paper, rote memorization, and writing on the dry-erase board. Also, sadly for the kiddos, it will take away snow days.” — Winnie Williams Hall, 45, special education teacher, Nicholson STEM Academy, Chicago.
“We’re already talking about ensuring that virtual classes continue to be an option for our students because we might have students who are single parents who can’t come to a night class physically, but might be able to attend a night class virtually.” — Monica Fuglei, 44, English department chair, Arapahoe Community College, Littleton, Colorado
Vaughn, a school for students with special needs, was the first Chicago school to shut down last March after a classroom assistant had one of the earliest known cases of the virus in the state. Burkhalter and many of her peers are back to attending school in person.
Broussard lived on campus and attended a mix of in-person and virtual classes this year. She’s double-majoring in journalism and public relations.
Students and educators reflect on what stories they'll tell 10-20 years from now about teaching and learning during COVID-19
Harrison Hill, USA TODAY
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