Community in a time of COVID-19

By: Carrie Diaz Eaton, Associate Professor of Digital and Computational Studies, Bates College, @mathprofcarrie

A lot has happened over the last few months in the world. And it seemed to come to a rising frenzy over the last two weeks in academia as major conferences canceled, schools sent students home, and everyone discussed how to best finish out their semesters from afar.

This is a difficult time for all of us. I spent all of last weekend trying to catch up on everything out there I needed to know about the SARS-CoV-2 strain of coronavirus so that I could make the right calls on everything from classroom instruction to whether my own workshops and personal travel needed to be canceled. Everything else became difficult to focus on. The landscape here changed quickly as it was clear cases were rising exponentially, turning this variant strain into a COVID-19 pandemic.

All of a sudden, we began social distancing - a set of recommendations meant to slow the spread of the disease. In addition to the regular expectations of staying home while sick and washing hands, we began canceling large gatherings, recommending against touching or hugging, and moving our instruction from face-to-face to online. While all of this is critically important to lower transmission in order to “flatten the curve,” this means for some the removal of some of the most important parts of their jobs and lives - the ability to connect with people in a community.

How do we maintain community in a time of COVID-19 - how can we love in a time of coronavirus?

Be compassionate

To each other, to yourselves, to your students, to your families. Put aside judgement. There is not only one right answer here, just hard decisions. Assume that everyone is doing the best they can with what they have. And don’t assume you know their constraints. Many of my fellow academic parents now have their children home due to school closures in addition to their full-time job. Some schools are explicitly making policies to not count evaluations from this semester, some are converting to pass-fail for students. But often our worst critics are ourselves - this means giving yourself permission and forgiveness. Don’t suffer in the name of perfection, or as one blog puts it “Please do a bad job of putting your courses online.”

Be in communication

One of my colleagues recently said he surveyed his students, and they just wanted communication. Just like many of us as we waited for our administration to make a decision, our students also want to know that someone is thinking about this.  They want to know what will happen. My children have been asking about their April vacation. “Mom, are we going to cancel? Papa shouldn’t go - he’s too old.” Lack of communication leads to anxiety and, against this backdrop, in particular, fear. Many of us already know how fear and anxiety actively prevent learning. This applies not just to mathematical learning but also sorting through the incredible amount of information and misinformation about COVID-19. On the other side - ask for help. It is okay to admit that you are struggling with this immense change, need help getting online to find resources, or need to talk about something else for a bit. Also, I suspect many of us want to help and just don’t know-how. 

Be in community

One of the most beautiful things I’ve seen is the crowdsourcing of help documents and Zoom chat meetups on Facebook and Twitter, the formation of open education communities like the one on MAA Connect and QUBES, and beautiful stories on my email about how my own campus community is helping students and each other through this with as much support as possible. Even without our formal gatherings, our community is still there for us. Don’t do this alone. You don’t have to. 

Remember that we already are a community, even in a time of COVID-19.