Looking Back: One Year Online

First year university. A time for new beginnings, new classes and even a new school. Little did I know that the ‘university experience’, you know the one that you see in the brochure, would be drastically different from the one that I had.

While I do miss being able to roll out of bed ten minutes before my Zoom class started and often sat in class while still in my pyjamas, I would not trade in person classes for anything. Instead of getting to find my favourite study spot on campus, my home office became my classroom for the next ten months. Truthfully, I’ll never be able to look at my desk the same ever again. It is a permanent reminder of the loneliness and isolating effect being online had on me. I found myself sitting there many nights at 3 am trying to get through readings and assignments when I was suffering from insomnia because I figured if I couldn’t sleep from the stress I felt, I may as well try to be productive. I was forced to navigate uncharted territory of Zoom university in the heavily charted territory of my office. During my lectures, I attempted to stay engaged and even braved turning on my camera for a few of my classes, but after a while looking at my computer screen for back to back lectures gave me terrible headaches and made me question daily if I should stay in online university. 

As Ontario kept re-opening and shutting down again, I couldn’t help feeling as though I would never return to in person learning and Zoom was going to become the new normal. I knew I was missing out on a ‘normal’ experience but I soon came to realize that I could either grieve not being in person and let that define my year or I could try to make the most of what I did have. In spite of everything, I chose the latter and in my eyes I managed to make the most of my first year even though it's not what I envisioned. I was lucky enough to befriend two girls in my program, one who I went to high school with and the other I knew through mutual friends and between the three of us we were able to help each other through the year and eventually became super close friends.

I joined this newspaper and am grateful to be a part of this amazing team! I even started volunteering for a nonprofit that focuses on period poverty and began contributing to the Walleye, an arts and culture publication in Thunder Bay. Resilience is an underlying quality that I’ve undoubtedly further developed during my first year and will continue to do so throughout my university career.

I now have a greater appreciation for being in person and even though I have an 8:30 in person accounting class this semester, you won’t hear me gripe about waking up early because I am just happy to be back in real life.