After completing over a year of a pandemic, the world is starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel with the COVID-19 vaccines being distributed throughout the nation. With the hope of a future where a virus does not dictate our lives, it leads to a reflective state of mind on what this halt to normal life could lead to for the students in our society.

Stopping school in March to switch to distance learning was unprecedented and not the ideal choice of learning. Even if it wasn’t an ideal way to learn, it was the best option under the present circumstances. Though it did work somewhat successfully, the educational value of school online was less for the rest of the year as teachers and students were unfamiliar with the system. The summer of 2020 was used in order to prepare for the new year of unprecedented schooling. In March, it was the end of the year with only about two months or so left of school. A whole new school year digitally would have been a new struggle. With the implementation of the hybrid schedule, WHS did provide students with a way to stay safe from COVID-19 while also getting some in-person learning time. Though many schools did this type of schedule or even all digital or all in-person learning in the 2020-21 school year, the impact of education that took place during the coronavirus might have a bigger toll than imagined on future society. 

Students, who have been acquainted with teachers teaching in person, have often gotten lost while fully online or on the online days in the hybrid schedule. With the hybrid schedule in place, many lessons that would normally take one day were taking two days as an in-person lesson was often required. That delay in learning might have a small impact upon those who actually did stay caught up. However, students are falling behind in online schooling. Percentages all across the nation of those failing at least one class have gone up from school to school in almost all cases. It was easier while in online learning or hybrid scheduling to skip a few assignments and to fall behind in the process of completing assignments. 

Though these concepts are impacting students currently, the impact in the future is what concerns me. What if a fundamental life skill was taught over online learning poorly but are expected to be known? Or what if the student skipped an important assignment? No matter what is the cause for a lack of learning, the effects will likely be seen. 

The pace of colleges might be difficult for incoming students as high schools slowed down their pace because of COVID for a while. You could argue that the online assignments helped for students to learn responsibility towards completing assignments independently on time. However, late work has been seen as a regular this year and students have often had to use this. While grades are dropping, so is the morale of the student. 

No matter which angle you are experiencing the pandemic from, life has been made increasingly difficult in many ways. From those in an educational environment preparing for the future, the impact might not be known for a while. In fact, the impact may only be a minimal one. But nonetheless, the strain put on those in the educational system will cause a change for this generation in the future with gaps in their education.