As a Baby Boomer who returned to academia late in life, after a career in law enforcement and a long hiatus from the classroom, it was a bit of a shock as to how much the Internet age had changed higher education. Not much going in the realm of pen to paper, except for note taking.
So, this semester, changing over to remote, online or hybrid classes has taken a lot of effort on my part to make an adjustment. I envy my much younger fellow classmates and their ability to handle this. Believe you me, if you think it’s hard, it is even more so for a digital immigrant like me. But I am hanging in and dealing with it, as most of us are.
“These are the times that try men’s souls.” In the 240 years since Founding Father Thomas Paine wrote those words, this country has endured many wars, conflicts–both internal and external–several epidemics and pandemics, and survived them all. For the most part, we have emerged stronger and more unified.
At this point, with the presidential election behind us, it is still hard to imagine unity, but certainly we students are all in this together.
Since March of this year, our academic lives have been disrupted to a degree we could never have imagined. Depending on our majors and the academic requirements some of us have been set back even farther than others. Moreover, some communities have been hit harder than others by the pandemic, communities many MCCC students belong to.
The inability of the federal government to lead at this critical time is something that we have faced and must continue to face bravely not only as students of MCCC but as citizens of this country.
We don’t know if things will be different next year, but as an old-timer I can tell you that while I may not know Zoom, I know we can and will persevere.
