The first day of school was my birthday. I know, imagine having your birthday on the first day of school. Waking up super early, getting ready 20 minutes before the class starts, and just waiting.  High school can be tough sometimes, especially with finals, AP/IB exams, and especially not being able to socially interact with other people during this time. Also,  just taking the time to attend school virtually can be a real pain. And now the moment we’ve all been dreading has finally come: the first week of school. Let me tell you, I wasn’t excited about going back to school virtually, but I knew it was the safest option with the current pandemic.

 The first week of school was a real struggle. Over quarantine and summer break, my sleep schedule was all over the place. Sometimes, I would sleep at 6 a.m. and wake up at 8 a.m; other nights I would usually pull all-nighters. Every day of school this week, it would always be hard to wake up, take a shower, get ready. Also, there were so many internet connections and zoom issues. Zoom was working fine the first two days of school, but there was a real issue of actually linking our accounts to Schoology.

 Schoology is a virtual learning environment app. With Schoology, what we are using, there is nothing wrong with it, and I am excited to see how it works as it is an “all in one” app. It’s just that I would prefer Google Classroom over Schoology, just because teachers and students are already more familiar with it. Also, teachers wouldn’t have to spend so much time focusing on moving their whole curriculum to Schoology. Google Classroom is much easier to navigate as well. 

 I knew that the first week of school wasn’t going to be the best week ever, but I also didn’t know how many struggles would come. However,  there wasn’t anything special about the first week of school other than the fact that it was virtual. 

Also, having school every day for only 3 hours for the first week of school, I felt there was no point. Personally, I would’ve liked 105 minutes of classes this week, so we would be more used to it by the end of the week. Next week, we’ll be more used to the new block schedule. Having the “main” class for this week was helpful to some extent. I felt it was nice getting to know everyone in my advisory class and learning a lot about how Schoology will work/an overview of virtual learning.  However, most of the days the majority of information is what we already knew and we talked about generic topics, such as “what we eat yesterday,” or “what’s our favorite activity to do.” 

It was nice to meet all the teachers, but they could’ve still done introductions and give a more in-depth overview of the course, with 105-minute classes. Plus, students could’ve gotten a head start. Considering I’m taking 2 AP’s (excluding MVU and A2 Virtual courses) this semester: AP Chemistry, AP Microeconomics, I would’ve really liked to have started on them already. 

All of this may not sound like a big deal, but it was to me because I was just getting more used to the idea and the “routine” of virtual learning.  In just one year our whole lives literally turned upside down.  It was only a year ago,  I remember my freshman self walking through the halls of Huron. It’s funny how so much can change in a year: with the pandemic, the Black Lives Matter movement, and other political issues occurring in the world. 

Overall, the first week of school wasn’t an utter disaster, which is what I expected. It just felt very different and surreal.