Quarantine Tales: My Thoughts After a Month of Online School

This past month has been interesting, to say the least. Everyone has had to make major adjustments to their everyday lives to adapt to this new normal. One of the biggest transitions for me, and probably every student, is coping with remote learning. Over the past month, I have been mentally collecting my thoughts and opinions about this whole kerfuffle. My hope is that I can help other college students (or anyone who shares these feelings) struggling with this transition feel less alone and help validate their emotions.

I did not realize that I took my routine and school day for granted until now. My campus was my safe space where my daily routines were like clockwork. One thing that college taught me was responsibility because I needed to handle a full class schedule, work and extracurriculars, all while making sure I took care of myself. Life has come to an abrupt halt and it was my responsibility to put together a new routine that works for me. Let me tell you, the journey has not been easy. My days went from starting at 9:30 in the morning to 2 in the afternoon and ending at 5, which has completely tampered with my sleep and productivity. I went from being busy for 12 hours straight to having too much free time. Once classes started being reincorporated into my daily schedule, it made me feel like I had some structure to my day again. I also really struggled with finding an “escape” from school. Given that everything is taking place at home, I had to find new ways to distress myself and separate my life from school. I am a big fan of taking long walks and getting lost in the music playing in my headphones.

Online school is exhausting. Staring at screens, all with endless Zoom calls and figuring out new websites and apps, has my brain and eyes feeling absolutely fried. I don’t know about you, but the new workload is very overwhelming. My professors have started piling on extra assignments to make sure that we are staying occupied, and it’s a lot to handle. Given all I have been through for the past four weeks, I’ve realized that online schooling is truly a double-edged sword. For example, it’s nice working at your own pace so you’re able to be less stressed with deadlines. At the same time, it’s easier for me to get distracted and be lazy with my work, so I’m starting to hate the daily mundanity of distance learning. Personally, I am someone who feels more comfortable learning in a classroom, so I knew this was going to be an obstacle for me. My lack of self-discipline is something that I have definitely been working on this past month. One thing that I really recommend is making daily lists of realistic goals that can be accomplished. It helps me manage my tasks effectively and shows me what my priorities should be.

So far, online school has taught me a lot about myself and how I operate. It has been a very challenging time, and one thought that keeps me sane is that we’re all in the same boat together.

• college
• online school