Students persevere after COVID
After attending a dinner at her grandmother’s house, Emily Tran fell sick with Covid-19. It was everyone’s worst fear, and now it had happened to her. “I guess it’ll be a fun story in the future to tell people that I survived a pandemic while getting the virus,” she said.
In the month of January, at least 137 CVHS students tested positive for Covid-19. This number is 23 times higher than the monthly average since this school year began. The Omicron variant, along with the continuation of most activities, created a surge in the virus that came closer to home than ever before.
Although cases are on the decline and the coronavirus’ effect on our everyday lives is bound to fade, the experiences held by CVHS students who caught the illness will linger in their memories for the rest of their lifetimes.
Many of the students who tested positive in January contracted the virus during winter break, whether it be from a sports tournament or a family member. Juniors Tran, Nick Pronske, and Jonny Lin were all vaccinated with two shots of the Pfizer vaccine, but no booster. They are a few of countless breakthrough cases that emerged due to the new variant. The juniors tried to be as cautious as possible, but it was often difficult to do so because so many activities were continuing. Despite constant efforts to stay safe, the virus still took its toll.
The students had relatively severe symptoms for three days and mild symptoms for the remainder of their quarantines. While some had it worse than others, the main effects were a cough, runny nose, sore throat, chills, and headache.
“Being vaccinated definitely helps a lot, because the long term effects on my body might have been worse if I wasn’t vaccinated. Some people had irreversible damage to their bodies after, but I didn’t have any,” noted Lin.
A common theme in their experiences was the feeling of isolation. Tran was separated from her family during meals, constantly wore a mask, and slept in her family room. Lin stayed in bed all day and lost motivation to do anything.
“It was pretty lonely, to be honest,” expressed Pronske. His entire family fell sick and avoided each other whenever possible. “We were all down and couldn’t help each other. It was a bit rough. After going two weeks without seeing anybody, I realized just how important connections are.”
Because of their positive tests, the juniors were all absent from school for at least a week. An unexpectedly extended winter break caused them to miss critical time for kickstarting the second semester of arguably the most important school year of their lives.
“A huge downfall was my learning. When I returned, I had three Fs and tests to make up, which was a little discouraging,” commented Tran. “I was eventually able to catch up a couple weeks later, but I had to use up a lot of class, Trojan, and lunch time to completely make up all of the work.”
While at home, the students had to be proactive and contact their teachers to keep up with their studies. Even so, learning is simply not the same without face-to-face communication.
“It was hard to find out what I should have been doing in school,” said Pronske. “I emailed all my teachers and they were very responsive and helped me a lot, but it was still difficult to try and stay up to date when you’re at home.”
In spite of whatever hardships they endured, the students were able to come out of quarantine triumphantly and return to some sort of normalcy. Having the virus and experiencing the thing that has turned our world upside down caused the students to have changed perspectives.
“In a positive light, my big takeaway is that you really don’t fear anymore,” explained Lin. “The virus is another thing that happens today. You feel more confident and unafraid to go back to life before Covid-19. It just kind of feels like: well, I’ve already been through it. So everything will be okay.”
I can relate to some parts of this article because I have gotten COVID before, but it did not have an impact on me. I was forced to skip a day of school, so I had more work to do in order to catch up. I can also see how missing a few days of school can mess you up since you would have to miss important lessons.
I think it is sad that they have to stay home because of the virus. When we first came back to school, I got sick too, so I had to stay home for a week, which was stressful, because I had to do a lot of homework and tests. Which was hard because they can’t just get them all done in one day and it was hard to study all the stuff you have missed by yourself. I know how they feel when they come back and was stressful with their grade seeing that it drop down to an F’s.
I’m glad our cases are slowly decreasing, it means we as a community are taking initiative! It was scary to see people go out for a week or weeks, and just it was around the time when everyone was getting a cold so no one really knew if it was covid or not.
This article is a great way to see a glimpse of the lives of CVHS students who had contracted Covid-19. It was interesting to see what the students experienced, along with how they felt, both during and after the virus. Jonny Lin’s quote is a good positive outlook on the years to come, stating, “I’ve already been through it. So everything will be okay.”
It is wild how many people caught covid after winter break, I am really glad that they recovered from it and are feeling better.
It’s incredible how so many students caught covid in the span of 2 weeks
It was shocking how many students were out after winter break. Class sizes got as small as ten people per class. I remember one of my teachers saying that it was practically impossible to both teach students in-person and online while they were quarantining. I also liked how this article included how isolation made people less connected to their peers.
I found it interesting how many students got covid after coming back to school, its nice to see how they stayed on top of their work even though they were sick.
I think it’s interesting to know what it was like to gain covid to try to recover and catch up on school. I think it’s interesting to know what it was like to gain COVID and later try to recover and catch up on school work. It must have been very challenging to catch up with everything. It also must have been hard being alone for two weeks. I hope their families and them are safe and healthy.
This article is interesting because I didn’t really know how many people got covid during winter break until we all came back to school and saw that a lot of kids were missing from the classes. I can also relate to the students feeling depressed because that is the same way I felt when I got covid, so I guess it is nice to know that I wasn’t the only one feeling that way.
What stuck with me was the part of how COVID might be remembered forever. I agree with this, as this might be the most important event in 21st century history, possibly even more so than 9/11. Whereas some countries could ignore the drama between the USA and the middle east, pretty much the whole world was directly affected, from young to old, here and there, etc. Tying into how the article talks about how omicron is so much more powerful than previous versions but covid is still very dangerous in general, I remember hearing somewhere that the USA’s death toll by covid was like 9/11 happening every day (both killed thousands in a single day). I think that is an incredible comparison that really puts perspective the scope of covid. Lastly, I find it strange and very scary that “long-covid” and persisting symptoms seem more common compared to other illnesses like the flu. It is also scary that many breakthrough cases are happening (even with some vaccine shots). I hope that an additional thing (whether it be a vaccine or cure) against covid is found in order to remedy those two facts above.
Although I haven’t been a target for COVID yet, I can still relate with this article because of my brother being a victim of COVID. Emily Tran’s troubles were similar to what my brother had to face like having to stay inside a room 24/7 and eating alone. Whenever i’d have to drop off food in front of his bedroom door i’d feel bad because he can’t join the family whenever we eat together and I always wondered how bored he must’ve felt just locked in a room for a whole week or two. This article can be a very relatable topic to other readers and I believe that more students should read this.
like the idea that the article talks about adapting to covid-19. I certainly agree that covid has significantly impacted our life and changed the way we interact. I think that if more people start getting vaccinated the cases will drop and we will be able to return to life before. It was very interesting to see how there were lots of cases during the first few weeks of school. I was worried that we would have to return back to online learning. But luckily the cases have steadily decreased and we are still able to attend in person classes.
Even though I haven’t gotten COVID-19 yet, I can still relate to this because one of my family members (my brother) has gotten COVID before. The experiences that Emily Tran shared was very similar to what my brother also had to experience. We would force him to stay in his bedroom 24/7 and we’d also drop off food for him in front of his door whenever it was time for us to eat lunch and dinner. Whenever he went outside of his room we’d force him to wear a mask and clean the things he’s touched with anti bacterial wipes. Overall this article is very good and informative and I believe more students should read this article.
As the pandemic has been dragging on, it’s still very encouraging to have such open conversations about these fears and anxieties as it allows people to come together, maybe not physcially, but in community. Keeping not only yourself safe but also considering the health of your loved ones is scary at times, especially with close grandparents and those who are at high-risk. Thankfully no one in my household has gotten Covid so far, but I do know people who have had it and even a couple that have sadly passed away in relation to Covid. I appreciate how it seems that a good deal of people do take at least basic precautions such as masks seriously and that we are continuing to support other similar safety measures.
I’ve personally never had COVID, but I have come very close to it multiple times. Staying distant from people is crucial, especially if they were exposed. In my experience, people will always get sick at the absolute worst times possible. Call it Murphy’s Law, but the reality of the situation is that when we get caught up with things like social gatherings or activities, we are more at risk to contract any disease than if we just stayed at home. We forget to isolate, and the disease spreads further, luckily, the Omicron wave is nearing its resolution and we can continue as we have been for almost 2 years.
I could definitely relate to this, I caught Covid-19 during the summer and It wasn’t fun for me nor my family, we were all stressed about how to cope with being around each other. thank goodness I was already vaccinated and almost all my symptoms were gone in almost a week. I as well felt isolated while quarantining although I spent my days watching shows being creative such as drawing and painting. My question to people who were affected by Covid-19 is what did you do in your free time while quarantining?
I like how this article included how it not only affected people healthwise, but it also affected people’s education and made it much harder to learn new topics in school without physical interaction. It would also be hard coming back and getting more assignments while you try to catch up on the assignments that you missed while you were sick.
As a student who had tested positive, I could totally relate to this. I was hanging out with my friends on the last day of winter break, and one of my friend test positive at that night. Everyone else that went didn’t felt anything and we were all vaccinated. I actually got my booster shot during the winter break so I thought my vaccine worked. But after 7 days, I felt dizzy and sore throat during class. I went to the office immediately and got sent home. I stayed at home for 3 weeks and I was isolated from my parents because they didn’t have any symptoms. When I got back to school I saw 4F in my aeries, it was totally overwhelming for me. And I had many quizzes and tests to make up. It was just way too much things I have to catch up! I just hope everyone could stay safe and wear your mask.
I can relate to these stories a lot since one time I had been getting over a cold at the same time that my brother had caught covid around October so my entire family had to quarantine even though the only person to test positive was my brother. Luckily we were all vaccinated and so the symptoms of a stuffy nose and cough were fairly similar between the cold and covid. The only symptom that seemed different was the lost in taste and smell with my brother. It was definitely very lonely and hard to catch up on classwork in every class because it was essentially online learning without the teacher meetings. Then I came back to a week of tests in every class that I had and it really showed that the week of online learning had definitely taken a toll on my learning. Even though it was a hardship in my life, I was grateful that my brother didn’t have severe symptoms.
As Covid-19 has taken a toll on all of our lives, I can heavily relate to this article. Even though I personally haven’t gotten the virus, many of my family members around me have. It’s taken a huge toll on my family as it has caused separation and death. As this article expresses the hardships of isolation, it’s made me reflect on our past year of distance learning. Everyone at CVHS has persevered and grown so much throughout the duration of the pandemic. I am super proud of all of us as we were and are able to overcome challenges like these, together.
I like how this article has good and recent info on covid-19, how in January there were more cases than ever. I had covid shortly after winter break too, and I can say I felt the same way, isolated from my friends and stuff. The symptoms mentioned were also like the same, runny nose, sore throat, headache, etc. Me personally I only had one day where I had sever symptoms, and it was just my body hurting. I think the coronavirus may continue to imfect people, but in the future it will be more like the flu where its just there and you may have to get vaccinated every now and then.
I think that this article is very informative and tells of the struggles that CVHS faces when dealing with the pandemic at a local level. COVID-19 has affected everyone at CVHS in one way or another but it’s the strength that everybody shows and the responsibility that will make it so we can fight and get rid of this disease for good.
I like the idea of the article that it talks about adapting to covid-19. I certainly agree that covid has significantly impacted our life and change the way we interact but getting vaccinated is a good start to controlling the spread of covid. I was surprised by how high the cases had jumped in the beginning of january and I was a bit concerned at one point but I believe that we will just have to live with covid since it’s something not easily controllable.
It is interesting to see how many students got covid after coming home from break. It is also cool to see how everyone recovered and came back to school and got on top of their work even though it may be stressful.
I understand this article because not only is my mother a nurse but the lockdown hit hard when you could see the people you love anymore. My mother works in the medical field so I had to be extra cautious when it came to covid because I didn’t what to give it to her and I didn’t what to get it from her. I also experienced the depression of no longer being able to see my friend and family.
OH MY! I am super scared of this whole Corona Virus, luckily I have not gotten the Disease but yet I worry about the kids that have gotten it. I am really admire the ones that have gotten it and have persevered through it. I felt really bad for the kids who have gotten it and have missed almost a week and a half of work. But luckily our cases have been slowly decreasing.
I can relate to the article because my family too contracted covid 19 right after new years. We were so careful, we washed our hands,wore masks, did everything we could and still caught the virus. We had a small new years party with our extended family and here comes the first week back the second day I am at home again because slowly by slowly everyone started to test positive for covid.I was out for two weeks, when I came back thankfully most of the work I could do online but none the less the work when I returned was still overwhelming. I don’t think we will ever be the same from the experience and I know many recover or be less scared but I think my family and I will always be just as scared as we were in the beginning. I think its the fact that we were so careful and still got it makes it even more scary.
As a student who also tested positive for the virus. I know the feeling of isolation at home and worry about family. My whole family was tested positive and all have symptoms. It’s a very hard time at home and waiting. Catching up assignments and tests are also hard work, since I got five F’s after I came back, and it was very shocking that I knew the next progress report was due the next couple days. Last of all, I hope everyone stays safe.
This article is something I can relate too, because I too caught covid during the Omnicron surge so I can easily relate to what my fellow students said. Missing a week or more of school is a very hard thing to recover from grade wise with all the late work and such so hearing that these students were able to persevere through that is inspiring. The article itself is very well written and gets to the point very well.
i think that this article really emphasized the aspect of connections. you do not realize how important coming to school to see people really is until you cannot see them anymore. i think it was very hard for everyone who had come down with covid and couldn’t see their friends or family.i was also very surprised with how high the cases had jumped in just january alone.