COVID-19 impacting students beyond school grounds

IUPUI students had to make drastic changes when school chose to move online as the coronavirus epidemic entered Indiana. Students that lived in on-campus housing had to go home, and many students who live on campus are not citizens of Indiana. All students are now using Zoom to attend class, and it is harder to maintain being at home.

“Many things changed for me due to the coronavirus, my scheduled trip to D.C. was canceled, my internship at a hospital was put on pause, all my classes were shifted online, and my graduation for my master’s degree was postponed,” graduate student Khajae Henry said.

 

“Being taken out of the school environment and being home the entire time has made me less motivated to do my work, it is much harder to stay on top of it all,” nursing student Diamond Brown stated.

Students trying to get out of bed to drive to school is tough enough, but to get out of bed to get on your laptop is harder. The motivation to do your work is harder to maintain because the environment is never as productive as a school environment is for most people. Also, the workload has completely changed. Due dates are now closer to one another, and schedules have been changed by professors. Now, multiple classes have big assignments due the same day.

“Virtual clinical can be frustrating enough, but all of our assignments in classes have been piled up and our due really close to one another,” Brown continued.

Students who worked on campus have been lucky to keep their jobs for the most part, but students with internships are stressed. Internships are hard enough to capture, but for them to be postponed and cancelled means there is a chance they will not get them back.

“It took a mental toll on me to have gone from working and interning at Disney World, living on my own in Florida to coming back home where its cold, I don’t have my own room, I can’t leave my house, meet my friends, and my grandmother is completely dependent. She needs to be changed, fed, and constantly having her channel changed since she doesn’t know how to work her TV,” senior Tayah Bullock stated.

For students like Bullock, the internship at Disney World meant finding independence. The coronavirus epidemic got her sent home and now has caused an emotional battle for her. Students whose income was coming from working or paid internships are now struggling to even keep up with bills.

Students who graduate this semester are now forced to either wait to have a graduation or not have one at all. Most people wait their entire lives for the moment to graduate from college, but that opportunity may have gone away. College graduates are rare and the ones who are graduating this semester may not have the chance to feel the atmosphere others before them have. Graduating from anywhere is a great feeling, but not being able to walk across that stage as a college graduate takes away the opportunity for a once-in-a-lifetime feeling.

“It is hard to care about APA format or grammar when people are dying, especially when it’s uncertain if myself or my loved ones will be afflicted by this virus,” said Henry.