The year is 2020, it is a new year and a new decade, a fresh start from the past. For many of us, it will be our final year in high school and our first year in college while some of us are completing college or entering our final year. I for one, was ready to turn 18, graduate high school, and attend Dean College, majoring in sports broadcasting and ready to make new friends in college. I was excited for 2020, it would be a new year and a new decade so I could start fresh and enter adulthood and gain real world experience.
In March, I was about two months out from graduation and not only was I excited to graduate, but I was also on my high school golf team and was looking forward to participate in tournaments with my teammates. Suddenly I was hit with unfortunate news, that the spring sports season would be cancelled. Not only that, but the NBA was postponed, and the NCAA tournament was cancelled entirely, all due to the COVID-19 outbreak. Shortly after this, the Governor of North Carolina, Roy Cooper, made the decision to put the state on lockdown and schools online for the remainder of the semester. This lockdown has since been loosened, but it was still in effect for my state long enough where I could not celebrate my eighteenth birthday, our schools could not have graduation ceremonies and my friends, and I could not see each other to day goodbye before going to college.
Fast forward to July, lockdowns in North Carolina had since been lifted and now we could travel out of state. Originally, I was supposed to go to a sports broadcasting camp here at Dean College, where we would be doing a variety of activities, such as making podcasts, doing interviews and visiting the New England Patriots training camp. Unfortunately that was
canceled. I thought that was just a bump in the road, as I was still optimistic that I would still be able to attend school and do cool things anyways.
I was sadly mistaken, as on July 17th, I received the disappointing news that my first semester of college would be online. Seeing this was a big disappointment to me and my peers, as we would have to wait longer to actually attend college and made me think about dropping out for the first semester. I decided against dropping out of the first semester, and right now I am currently attending classes virtually. I like the classes I am taking right now, but I was looking forward to being in person to learn where I could meet new people and have new experiences, and it was very disappointing to see that I would have to wait for that to happen.
Fast forward to October, students here at Dean have just completed their midterms and are now a little more than halfway done with their classes. We were informed that the decision of whether or not we would be able to attend college in the spring semester, a decision that if it went our way we could attend college, and get to finally meet up with each other, along with the fact that we could do things in person that we could not do virtually. If the decision did not go our way, we would have to wait another year to attend college in person, and those of us who are freshman would have to wait until we are sophomores to attend college in person and those who were seniors, would not be able to attend our final semester at Dean.
Fortunately, the decision we have long been anticipating has just been announced and it went the way most of us wanted it to. On October 29th, it was announced that Dean College would be in person next semester, much to my delight. For me, it means that I will be moving out of my home state North Carolina, where I have lived for most of my life, to Massachusetts. This will be a big adjustment, as the two states have very different climates. I currently live in a state that shuts down with the mere mention of snow, to a state that gets more snow in a day than I would see in ten years. Despite the weather adjustment, I am still excited to attend college in person.
Now that it is official that we are attending college in the spring in person, there are still protocols we will have to follow, such as having a negative test for COVID-19 and not being able to have off campus guests. If that means we can attend in person classes, than in my opinion it is worth it. Being on campus and being able to interact with fellow students who have similar interests and being able to get experience in whatever field we are pursuing are some of the things I have been most looking forward to for college.
I look forward to meeting new friends and experiencing life in a different state. As a sports broadcasting major, I am looking forward to covering sports across the college and meeting people who want to do the same things that I want to do, to gain experience and learn new things. The current semester is nearly over and the spring semester will start on January 25th 2021, I along with my peers are excited to start a new journey at Dean.