Many didn’t know what to expect of the first semester of the 2020/2021 school year. In August, the U.S. was headed towards the highest number of COVID cases in the Pandemic. Many students spent their summers with limited information about how school would proceed in the Fall.
August 10: The year began in hybrid schedule; On-campus classes for the high school were on Monday and Tuesday, and E-learning on Zoom for the rest of the week. Upon arrival students’ temperatures were taken outside before entering the school building. Hand sanitizer stations were set up everywhere that the eye could see. Green and blue tape marked lanes to walk in to encourage physical distancing. Being back in school felt “eerie” says Aaron Shenk, because the normalcy of school contrasted with social distancing practices reinforced over the summer. High school students gathered in the gym before class for an informational assembly. At lunch we were instructed to sit three people per table. Ana Yoder remembers feeling like “the precautions were inconsistent. Three people at a table isn’t 6 feet apart”. However, many of these feelings started to fade when news of a vaccine being on the horizon came to fruition.
August 14: First COVID-positive student identified and quarantined
Wednesday “flex days” became common towards the middle of the year. Monday and Tuesday would be E-learning days, Thursday and Friday would be on campus and Wednesdays served as a catch-up day for students and teachers. Many became accustomed to this schedule so it was a hard adjustment when we returned in January to in-person four days a week.
Mid-March is when students returned to the full five days a week schedule that we experience in a typical year. It’s hard to believe that it’s only been two months since we weren’t here full time! COVID precautions such as masks and physical distancing were still enforced during this time but many students began to feel more comfortable around each other once they became vaccinated. Interterm was able to happen this year as well as Prom and other fun activities.
Band, orchestra, and choir concerts, all-school chapels, sports’ Senior nights. All of these were able to happen thanks to the growing number of Americans vaccinated and the consequential relaxation of CDC guidelines. Bethany and its enforcement of precautions also helped make these things possible. We will close the year with a whopping 0% on-campus COVID-19 transmission rate! It’s finally May and the light is visible at the end of the tunnel. Upperclassmen are finishing AP testing and final projects. High schoolers are very lucky and thankful for not having any non-AP final exams this year. Sports seasons have their last meets, matches, and games this week — except for golf, which continues until early June. Seniors did their skip day, skank day, and we assume prank day is on its way!
Now only one and a half weeks of school remain. Sectionals for several sports teams are underway and Seniors are busy planning for their graduation open houses. Let us remember the good memories we made together this year even in the face of such a devastating and spirit-dampening pandemic.
Go in peace~