How has your experience returning to school been? For many of us, it has been a rocky path. There are so many new things to get used to and so many old things we have to remember how to do.

This transition has been challenging for teachers as well. They must get used to being in-person. They need to change how they teach to accommodate the transition between digital and physical. Some teachers may have to teach a curriculum that students should have learned last year but didn’t have time to learn due to COVID. And, most of all, they have to help students come back successfully. Many students may have shortened attention spans, trouble sitting still, worse social skills, issues waking up early, and numerous other problems that could inhibit their ability to learn.

To get their opinions on coming back and how they will help us, the students, return smoothly, I interviewed a few teachers. They gave unique perspectives on how everything is going for them as well as students.

First, I spoke to Dr. Benavidez. She is a P.E. coach who teaches multiple grades. She is extremely nice and understanding and she makes P.E. a great experience. I had her in my freshman year and, even though we were working digitally, I learned a lot and she helped to motivate me to begin working on fitness in my own time.

Question 1: Is having more in-person students this year posing a challenge for you?

Dr. Benavidez’s response: “It is, it has its own challenges in the P.E. world.”

Question 2: Do you believe students are having an easier or more difficult time learning and coping this year?

Dr. Benavidez’s response: “I think students are resilient and I think that the kids who are here are doing the best that they can to really learn the new way of doing stuff.”

Question 3: Do you have any ideas in mind on how you will ease the transition between digital and physical learning for students?

Dr. Benavidez’s response: “Yeah, so last year I really had to work on developing a framework that was conducive to our online platform, which was Teams — not the easiest one to work with. So, this year, considering the fact that we may be getting back online, I just want to make sure that we are as prepared as possible for that by following similar framework. By having that prepared, it has really helped me just kind of get a jumpstart, ready to jump back into it if necessary and hopefully kids are ready to jump back online if necessary.”

Question 4: Is it strange to get back? What was difficult to get used to?

Dr. Benavidez’s response: “It wasn’t strange to go back, I think it was strange coming back to the unknown. It was kind of maybe scary just because it was unknown, but not strange. It felt really good to be back on campus.”

Question 5: Did quarantine have an effect on students’ physical fitness? If so, what?

Dr. Benavidez’s response: “I think so, and we’re truthfully going to find that out in the next couple months when we start pretesting. Attitude-wise, though, I think folks are ready to get moving and get away from being so sedentary, but we’ll take a look at fitness level soon.”

Question 6: Any other thoughts?

Dr. Benavidez’s response: “I’m excited to be here and it’s really cool to meet all of the students who I didn’t get to meet last year. I want to stay here as long as we can in-person, you know?”

My second interview was with Ms. Renfro. She is a freshman AP Human Geography teacher. She cares deeply about every single student, and you can tell. She asks for “good news” every start of class, and I know that helped to make me and many other students feel at home and appreciated.

Question 1: Is having more in-person students this year posing a challenge for you?

Ms. Renfro’s response: “The only challenge that I’m having is making sure students keep their masks on and knowing what the procedures are for when sick kids are sick and how to get information to them. But actually in the room it’s been so nice to be back in person.”

Question 2: Do you believe students are having an easier or more difficult time learning and coping this year?

Ms. Renfro’s response: “I think we’re all having a harder time coping. It’s hard being back in-person after so long, I think everyone’s a little insecure about their learning losses and anxious about COVID in general.”

Question 3: Do you have any ideas in mind on how you will ease the transition between digital and physical learning for students?

Ms. Renfro’s response: “I’ve been trying to a lot of community building, so a lot of making sure to ask students what good news they have, also asking them ‘What are you struggling with?’, ‘What are you frustrated about?’. Trying to connect students with activities that are on-campus, so they feel more a part of the campus, I think that’s really important as a freshman teacher that I do that.”

Question 4: Is it strange to get back? What was difficult to get used to?

Ms. Renfro’s response: “Yes, because everybody’s been nervous and anxious so that’s been kind of hard to deal with; and then also, everybody feels younger than they are. So, my freshmen say that they still kind of feel like 7th graders, my juniors say that they still kind of feel like freshmen, so nobody quite knows how they’re supposed to feel and act right now.”

Question 5: Were you able to teach everything you intended to?

Ms. Renfro’s response: “I’m going slower this year than I did over last year because I have more interruptions now, so more announcements, more kids leaving for sports, stuff like that.”

Question 6: Did more or fewer students enroll in AP courses this year and why do you think they did or did not?

Ms. Renfro’s response: “We have less students in AP classes, which makes me really sad. I think part of it is we didn’t get to do as much recruiting as we normally do; so normally we can go and talk about AP and say ‘Hey, come and join’, it’s not the same when it’s digital. Also, I think students are feeling overwhelmed by everything academically and they aren’t really feeling comfortable taking on that academic challenge right now.”

Finally, I interviewed Ms. Miller. She teaches sophomore AP World History. She’s a fantastic teacher and her classroom is quite unique and cozy. She has a very calming demeanor and is very kind. She clearly is passionate about her classes, which makes them fun to be in.

Question 1: Is having more in-person students this year posing a challenge for you?

Ms. Miller’s response: “It poses different challenges, just because we’re worried about people’s health. But otherwise, I think having in-person students has been wonderful as compared to last year. I think it’s nice to be back in person and I think it’s going a lot better.”

Question 2: Do you believe students are having an easier or more difficult time learning and coping this year?

Ms. Miller’s response: “I think they’re having a much easier time than last year. I think distance learning was very difficult on most students – emotionally and academically.”

Question 3: Do you have any ideas in mind on how you will ease the transition between digital and physical learning for students?

Ms. Miller’s response: “I think being more flexible because I think most students are happy to be back and if they didn’t really want to be here most of them went to the eLearn Academy. So, I think most students want to be here but the challenges are going to be students having to be quarantined all the time, so trying to be flexible, working with students on that, kind of being prepared ahead of time so they know what to expect, having pretty consistent routines for now, even if it’s repetitive. It’s probably better to help them with the transitions back and forth. I definitely adjusted the homework load from previous years because I don’t think we’re quite used to the level of work that we were two years ago.”

Question 4: Is it strange to get back? What was difficult to get used to?

Ms. Miller’s response: “It feels really good. I really missed being with students. I really hated teaching online. It is physically exhausting; I’m still adjusting to being on campus all day and the extra half hour over what we used to do. Another physical adjustment – I’m really tired.”

Question 5: Were you able to teach everything you intended to?

Ms. Miller’s response: “Definitely not, no. We had to cut back a lot, you know, students were really struggling to be engaged and to be able to complete things. Yeah, there’s a lot of adjusting that had to be done last year.”

Question 6: Did more or fewer students enroll in AP courses this year and why do you think they did or did not?

Ms. Miller’s response: “I’m not sure. My classes are pretty similar to what they were last year. So, I’m not sure overall. I have heard a lot more AP students have dropped this year than previous years, but I really haven’t had that many drops either. I’ve had a couple per class, which is pretty normal. I think campus-wide, yeah, we’ve seen a decline in AP. But I can’t say it’s significantly impacted me.”

Even though this transition has been hard for everyone, we’re incredibly lucky to have such caring and supportive teachers on our campus to help us come back to school smoothly and happily