Hello everyone!
This was the first week back to classes via Zoom. It’s been nice to have a little sense of routine again. Classes have been pretty straight forward and the transition relatively smooth. My art class meets at the regular time 3x a week and we have a live lecture over Zoom. The religious studies class I am in meets twice a week online all together over video call lecture/discussion and then one day a week is independent reading responses or doing online quizzes. My international affairs course still meets at our usual once a week slot for discussion. I am glad that we are still able to have classes together. It's fun to see my classmates and makes me feel more connected.
Nothing about this situation is easy. Lewis & Clark announced last week that students are able to choose which classes to take as Credit/No Credit this semester which is nice. I don’t think I will be using it since I anticipate getting A’s in all my classes. However, it is nice to be able to use the Credit/No Credit option for students who do not want their GPA to be impacted and cannot perform as well in classes due to the new circumstances. LC students have until April 24 which is the 2nd to last week of classes to decide if they want classes to be Credit/No Credit so it gives everyone some time to reevaluate how they are doing at that point.
My friends and I have been FaceTiming and Zoom calling often to just hangout which has been amazing. We talk about how it is just so stressful and hard to be doing the same amount of school work but now in a totally new setting without any of the resources or space we are used to at school. Going back to classes this week was definitely hard. It’s difficult to be in my own house where my family members are not doing school or have different schedules than me. In high school I would go to a coffee shop normally to do homework on the weekends but obviously I cannot do that now and am always surrounded by family that don’t have papers and readings to do. When I was actually at school I would spend most of my free time doing homework and it just doesn’t feel the same at home. At school I would have class till 1:30 or so and then essentially do homework until 10pm most nights. Now at home, I’m lucky if I spend even an hour doing homework. The motivation is definitely lacking and it’s hard to feel like school work even matters at this point. Still, I continue to get things done (slower than usual) and I can’t wait for the semester to be over.
I had an actually very productive day yesterday. I made a fun breakfast and then wrote an entire first draft paper for my religious studies class that’s due later this week. After that I ran 7 miles for the first time, which was very exciting. Then at night I made my first loaf of sourdough bread! And I ate some of the kimchi I started fermenting a week ago - it was delicious. I hung out with my friends on a Zoom call and started researching for another project late at night.
Stay safe and stay informed,
Sarah