Anxious Students

[kaysixteen]

Awright, spork's got a point, but it is still hard to fathom how NYU, to take the example from the CNN story, had 3+ months to arrange for appropriate food distribution services to quarantined returning students, and especially the new freshmen, and got it so badly messed up.   It is hard not to feel very badly for these kids, again, esp the frosh.  How many of us would wish to be incarcerated in such conditions?

[polly_mer]

Many of us have been saying for months that reopening campuses in the fall was not going to be essentially normal with masks and extra sanitizer.

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/05/14/how-campuses-might-make-best-undesirable-virtual-fall

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/03/magazine/covid-college-fall.html

https://www.npr.org/2020/05/05/848033805/6-ways-college-might-look-different-in-the-fall

Even Blocky at age 12 understood why we opted for fully online for him when we explained what in-person classes would be like:

* no lunch with friends

* no huddling with colleagues for group work

* no casual chatting with colleagues during quiet times in classes or during passing periods and breaks.

Yes, interacting with people is a good chunk of school at any level and the students on campus aren't getting that.  That's exactly why some places announced in May that they would be distance learning in the fall so students could make an informed choice regarding enrolling in college this fall or doing something else this year.  Other places were clearly delusional in their assumptions.

Relevant to this thread, CNN had an opinion piece on why humans are having such trouble mentally adapting to covid changes and the big problem was how most of us deal with ambiguity in contrast to risk: https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/22/opinions/covid-19-mental-health-sapolsky/index.html

People want to return to normal and the daily experience of pretending to be normal works, unlike recovering from the hurricane/fire/tornado or the continued problems in a war zone, right up until it doesn't.

[Caracal]

Maybe I'm a cranky old man, but I have a lot more sympathy toward a 32-year old single mom trying to get her dental hygienist's license by going to community college while juggling two part-time jobs than I have toward the 19-year old NYU student in a dorm room who's purchased a $2,000 meal plan. We rarely hear about the anxieties of the former.

I think that's fair in terms of the way in which an unrepresentative slice of college students dominates discussions. In terms of relating to students, anxiety isn't really about the objective conditions of the world. That's not how it works.

[spork]

Awright, spork's got a point, but it is still hard to fathom how NYU, to take the example from the CNN story, had 3+ months to arrange for appropriate food distribution services to quarantined returning students, and especially the new freshmen, and got it so badly messed up.   It is hard not to feel very badly for these kids, again, esp the frosh.  How many of us would wish to be incarcerated in such conditions?

It makes sense if you view NYU as being primarily a rent-seeking organization.

[Ruralguy]

Everyone in administration loves to say that they "under-promise and over-deliver" but if you look closely at them, they consistently do exactly the opposite.

[Bonnie]

Everyone in administration loves to say that they "under-promise and over-deliver" but if you look closely at them, they consistently do exactly the opposite.

Amen