COVID and College
Karen Romero — a senior at Whittier College discusses her experience with COVID-19 and the pandemic
I was really scared when I got sick” said Karen Romero, a Whittier College senior who contracted COVID-19 in mid-March. “Hearing about the coronavirus in class last semester, I didn’t expect it to be anything serious” Like most Americans, hearing about the coronavirus making its way into the United States didn’t seem very important for Romero. It was just a type of flu, and it couldn’t possibly be that bad. But little did we know, things were about to change in ways we could’ve never imagined.
Shortly after moving out of the dorms and back to Pomona, California with her family, Romero contracted COVID-19 from her sister, an ER nurse at the local hospital. At the time, testing was reserved for healthcare professionals and those at the highest risk, so Romero and her family were unable to get tested. Her symptoms began with a headache and slight fever and quickly accelerated to chills, fatigue, and a dry cough. Her recovery took two weeks, as she quarantined in her room away from her other family members. Romero felt very anxious having the virus and living with her parents, who were older and therefore more at risk. “I felt like downplaying how sick I was because I didn’t want to worry anyone” She said.
As she recovered, she attended online class via Zoom as normal and stuck to her usual routines. While battling COVID, Romero also stuck to online schooling and attending daily lectures.
Living in a home with so many people, Romero has made some changes to ensure focus in such a distracting environment. “I like have quiet time whenever I read or write so I wake up really early while my house is still quiet in the mornings” She said. Like so many college students, navigating this strange platform of online learning can be difficult at first, but by maintaining and developing new routines to ensure focus, it may not be so bad.
As we live through these unprecedented times during COVID-19, so much about our way of life has been interrupted. Parents forced to stay home with their children working from home, gyms, bars, and movie theaters closed, having to wear a mask everywhere you step foot outside, and so much more. For college students, the coming of age experience of being away from home, enveloped in a new culture with new people has been morphed into the drab and unexciting 8:00 am zoom meetings in your childhood bedroom. Being ripped from the college dorms, an environment filled with fun and new experiences with peers, and forced to return home. No sports, no in-person club meetings, no internships, no parties, and no graduation.
For Karen, contracting COVID-19 offered a unique perspective on the pandemic and a better understanding of the virus itself. “I always knew COVID was real and after I got it I think people are purposely denying how serious it is because it’s inconvenient for them” She said.
The reality of the pandemic must be taken more seriously. The virus is no longer a distant threat in a foreign country. It is here. It is all around us. In our communities, our schools, people are contracting the virus. There is no denying the effects COVID has had on our communities. If Whittier College had stayed open, Karen might have attended school as normally, unknowingly brought the virus on campus and spread to her peers. This is why socially distant learning is so vital to slowing the spread of this virus.
