On March 16, the University of Wyoming announced to students that classes would be online-only for the remainder of the semester.
This decision, due to the recent outbreak of COVID-19, put many students in a tricky situation as they had to reconfigure their lifestyles.
For students living in the residence halls on campus, the announcement of early move out followed the announcement of online-only classes. This announcement meant uprooting their entire lives and moving back home if they were able to.
“It was really upsetting to be leaving so soon and it felt like my time there should not have been over yet,” said Gwen Cameron, a UW student and dorm resident.
Many of the students living in the residence halls were away on spring break when they found out they would have to move out as soon as they possibly could. For many students, this made saying goodbye to their friends and roommates impossible, as everyone moved out at different times.
“Considering the situation, many of the people I [knew] on my floor, including my roommate, were not there when I moved out,” Cameron said. For her, this was one of the more difficult parts of moving out, as the chaos of the situation led to limited goodbyes.
Cameron was not the only student who felt this. Many students, especially freshmen, did not get to say their goodbyes to their friends, classmates and faculty members. Due to how many individuals had left for spring break by the time the news of online-only classes broke, most did not know their last in-person class before spring break would be the last.
Many faculty worked over the extended spring break to ensure online-only schooling would go as smoothly as possible for students once it began. As students moved out and attempted to make plans for living arrangements, faculty members attended meetings, met with others in their departments and learned how to provide online lectures and materials for their students.
“Moving to online classes has thrown a wrench into my college plan. It adds extra stress because communication with professors and other students is more difficult,” said Joseph Duncan, a UW student.
Duncan, like many other students, found that online schooling added a lot of stress on student life, as they had to learn to adapt to an entirely new foundation of learning. He said he felt it would be a challenging transition from studying on campus to studying in his house.
“My plan for online learning is to try to maintain the same things as I did for in-person classes. Watch the video lectures, study [and] do homework in between. I am still going to try to treat it like a job, despite being remote,” said Duncan, who also had to move out of the residence halls.
With many states enforcing lock downs due to the pandemic, finding a routine and transitioning to online-only learning overwhelmed some students.
“My opinion on everything that’s happening with COVID-19 is the usual. It’s frustrating for a lot of us,” said Audrey Whitman, a UW student. “Most people had to switch arrangements for work or had to uproot themselves to move back home and try a new learning environment that they’re not used to. Professors have to switch their methods of teaching, it’s all very frustrating.”
The sense of frustration was common between many students who felt overwhelmed by the sudden change in their lifestyles. However, some students, like Whitman, tried to keep a more positive view of the changing learning system.
“Many universities are trying to make a pass system. Graduate schools [and] jobs will know this semester was weird for everyone, so when they see the P they can see that these students passed the class. We’re trying to put our health first. People are going to be stressed and get bad grades due to a circumstance they can’t control. Obviously you don’t want to miss out on the education, but it’s a weird circumstance,” she said.
Whitman based her observations on rumors surrounding the Yale University pass system just hours before the University of Wyoming announced their own pass and fail grading system.
UW announced on March 26, just ten days after switching to online-only, they would be allowing students to take a satisfactory or unsatisfactory grade for any class taken this semester due to the circumstances surrounding the remainder of the semester.
Due to the chaos and panic that comes alongside a worldwide pandemic, the satisfactory and unsatisfactory grading offered by UW could lighten the burden that many students carry as they switch to online-only classes.
“The first priority of the world right now is health,” Whitman said.
