Reflecting on COVID’s impact five years later

Five years ago in March 2020, the coronavirus halted the lives of many and brought difficult and unexpected changes. The lives of students were completely different than before with everybody having to isolate themselves and move to online schooling. Classes were held on Zoom and Google Meets instead of in person.

Five years later, classes are held in person again and masks are rarely seen at school. Social distancing is no longer a thing and hand sanitizer bottles collect dust in the corner. But not everything has resumed to normal. The pandemic has had long lasting effects on many things.

One of the challenges in prior years was the loss in the ability to connect with fellow students and classmates. As prior student Sofia Palau said, “The greatest loss has probably been losing the opportunity to get to know my classmates better, and not making new friends like we usually do during the school year.” Though as time has gone on, it’s been easier for students to connect once again.

”I feel like I missed my last year of middle school because it was changed to online school. But I’m glad I was able to go through all years of high school normally,” said senior Andy Wong.

Mental health also became a major concern throughout the pandemic. Due to isolation, it became harder to communicate with others and seeing friends and visiting family was less frequent. 

“During COVID-19, I felt fine and I enjoyed not having to go to school but I feel like now I have a harder time talking with others,” explained senior Vesemir Pirogov.

Students are not the only ones who were impacted by coronavirus with teachers having to account for students’ lost years of learning. Online schooling made it more difficult for students to connect with the class, leaving some with an unsteady foundation.

”I didn’t have trouble integrating back into school but I saw some people in my classes who struggled more and fell behind, I think the worst classes were math and history,” explained senior Ryan Yang.

Math and guitar teacher Steve Wilkinson has noticed similar problems with his students over the past few years. “Students seem to have trouble thinking on their own afterwards and have shorter attention spans,” explained Wilkinson. “It seems it’s harder to get the gears going for them.”