Given the current state of not just the country, but the entire world, virtual learning has been one of the smaller problems that students have had to tackle this year. Nonetheless, it still has a big impact on the millions of students in America, and being a college freshman, I’ve definitely been subject to its effects.
We all know that virtual learning isn’t a new element of schooling that educators, their bosses, or the government quickly produced as a solution to quarantine. There are many students who, pre-pandemic, took advantage of virtual learning to swiftly manage other responsibilities they had, including work or internships. However, for the majority of us, managing virtual school has been a learning curve that we’re still adapting to.
I started virtual learning at the end of my senior year of high school when most of the grades had already fallen into the hands of senioritis. Despite teachers’ best efforts, it wasn’t an easy task to intrigue us, and the new barriers that virtual learning set between teachers and students made it seem impossible.
I didn’t have any definite expectations coming into college. I had ideas about what the experience was supposed to be like, but I had no idea how virtual learning would affect it. I felt excited to meet new people, but I anticipated the challenges of forming relationships with professors and classmates this time around. I dreaded having to pull myself out of my weekly cycles of procrastination, but I assumed with all the time on my hands, I’d be more than prepared to excel in all my courses. I was definitely wrong.
As virtual learning started, I felt myself getting more anxious. In high school, participation wasn’t a nerve-wracking task for me. Presentations always made me nervous, but simply sharing things about myself to the class, or even just giving answers and asking questions never took me a second thought. Participation was one of the things that made me more likable to teachers and helped display my interest in the class when my grades weren’t cutting it. The months of isolation spent in quarantine made me more socially anxious, and meeting professors and classmates through a screen didn’t help.
I first noticed my anxiety getting worse at the beginning of the semester. Most of my professors wanted to dedicate a class or two to fun icebreakers to familiarize everyone with each other. I dreaded it. Finding things to share about myself wasn’t a hard task; I’d picked up several hobbies during quarantine and found new books and movies that I identified with. Still, every time a professor asked “Who wants to go first?”, my sweaty hands started trembling, and my increased heart rate made it harder for me to speak. I’d always come up with a basic “I’m Amal, I’m 18, and I live in Queens” to speed through my answer, so I wouldn’t have to speak about myself again. I would be really upset with myself; I’d never felt so anxious over such a simple thing before. Since the beginning of the semester, my anxiety’s eased as I’ve been able to bond with students online over our shared challenges. But class discussions and “around-the-room” activities still get my heart rate soaring at times—especially when the responses consist of a lagged head nod or an awkward silence as the teacher figures out whether I’m done speaking.
The biggest hurdle I’ve had to adjust to with virtual learning is time management. I’ve been a procrastinator since I started high school, but for some reason, I imagined it’d go away with virtual learning. I thought I’d have all the time in the world—it’s not like I had any other impending responsibilities. But, I was wrong. Acknowledging that I had so much time to study and work on projects discouraged me from ever getting up to do it. In the few months of my first semester, I’ve had to stay up till three or four in the morning to finish assignments on multiple occasions, and have been gulping down two to three cups of coffee a day just to stay energized. I thought these habits would end with high school, but without any discipline within the walls of my bedroom, I’m still struggling.
Virtual learning is something everyone’s still trying to adapt to—students and professors alike. While the new challenges have changed my original perception of what college would be like, it’s the compromise we need for our education amidst a pandemic.