Reconnecting... - Isabella Sportelli

     

    

        This school year has no doubt been unforgettable, and I don’t mean in a good way. I have to admit, this is not how I imagined my “high school experience” to go. Ever since China released a virus that launched a global pandemic, it’s easy to say that the world has never been the same. China's lack of transparency, misinformation and severe measures used to silence voices trying to sound the alarm to the global community has cost thousands of lives and is shattering countless others. Swift action, forthcoming information, and cooperation with the world’s leading health experts on the part of the Chinese government could have saved thousands of lives and livelihoods. But it didn’t, so now nearly nine months later, thousands of students across the country are stuck at home attempting to make online schooling work, which might be the least of the world's problems right now. 

        Virtual learning has been a mess, to say the least. The computers are incredibly slow and can't handle having more than one tab open while on a meet. Not to mention, teachers and students alike are being kicked from their classes, audio is being cut-out, and by the end of a meet, my math teacher sounds like she could be a voice actor for a chipmunk. There is little to no teacher-student interaction and no socialization. Even with one of my classes having a total of seven students, it's still hard to connect with the teacher through the screen. Another downside is that I've missed out on a lot of really fun labs from my science classes like Biomed, which for "nerds" like me is very disappointing. Scheduling is another major issue. In Sparta, high schoolers have four classes each day, each for an hour. The purpose of this was to reduce screen time, but it also reduces class time. For students taking AP classes, this can make things much more stressful. AP classes are already moving fast as it is and now that they are meeting every other day, teachers have to move even faster to fit in all of the course material before the AP test. Overall, this has been an incredibly frustrating experience for everyone that I wish would end sooner than later. I actually used to like going to school for the most part, but now it's become the thing I dread the most. 

        On the positive side, teachers have been very understanding in light of this current situation. They have no doubt been trying their best, but unfortunately, there are a lot of factors out of their control. Elective teachers have been having an especially hard time considering most of the course work relies on in-person contact. Art classes such as Sculpture will have to completely change their course outline because many of the necessary materials such as clay and all the tools that go with it are in the classroom while students are stuck at home. However, personally, I do get more sleep and a lot more time to myself which is always a plus. I also would not be surprised if when we do eventually get back to school, online classes may still be offered. As we continue to go to school online, kinks are being worked out and as time goes on, this whole online process will most likely become more efficient. For example, snow days will never be a thing again, as we now have a way to "attend" school without actually leaving our homes. If anything, this experience has shown us that online schooling is a possibility (even if it's not exactly a plausible one at the moment) and might be the way of the future. 

        As for lockdowns in general, the media has been pushing the agenda that the only way to end COVID-19 is to stay at home, but these lockdowns were originally put in place to "flatten the curve," not to end the virus. We were told in the beginning that schools, along with everything else, would be shut down as to not overwhelm the health care system with hospital admissions, so why is it that schools are still shut down? There is no evidence to support that lockdowns work, in fact, they may be making the spread worse. According to TrendMacro, "from the start of the year to each states' maximum lockdown, lockdowns correlated with a greater spread of the virus. States with longer and stricter lockdowns also had larger COVID outbreaks." New Zealand, for example, even though it's a very isolated nation, was locked down harshly and then had to lockdown again due to cases from community spread. Lockdowns can delay the outbreak, but they can not prevent it. Suicide, hunger, and poverty rates are all up and millions of jobs have disappeared as a result of these lockdowns. In addition, there have been many inconsistencies when it comes to what we were told we can do and what we can't. We can go out to eat, sports are back on, stores have been opening back up with limited capacity, and hundreds of people rioting in the streets has been deemed helpful, but we still can't go back to school. By being barred from school, students are at a disadvantage despite the fact that COVID is significantly less deadly to children than the flu and that according to recent studies, children are not a chief of transmission vector to adults. Simply waiting around for a vaccine that could take years to develop is not a viable option, but what should be is reopening schools completely while making sure to protect the vulnerable. Hopefully, we can get back to school, wear our masks, and return to normalcy, if such a thing even exists anymore.