When covid became a mass epidemic in the United States, and we had those “two weeks” of school, I was in eighth grade. Now, I’m a senior in high school. I feel like I missed out on a large part of what high school could have been because of the setback that covid was.
I had the misfortune of getting covid three times, every time once we started going back to school. The first time I had it, I was out for two and a half weeks. While this was a little over two years ago, there are still lasting effects for me. I can’t eat greens without tasting soap and strawberries are either too sour or too sweet. I’ve started to dislike a lot of the foods I loved before also.
Covid had an effect social effects too. In my personal experience, I know I would be closer to more people and would have been more self-confident early on. However, because of the isolation, and the rising popularity of TikTok, any social skills I, and others, should have formed in the pivotal time of the first year of high school were lacking. It was hard to talk to people coming back from quarantine, most had no idea how to make small talk or make a friend.
In a global scale, rates of depression increased by 25% across the globe, according to the New York Times. The isolation from quarantine has delayed early development in young children and they reportedly score lower in language, motor skills, and thinking. Early development in being a person because this is the time of learning to develop relationships, get along with others, and problem solve.
I decided to do my own research and see how covid impacted the development of some of the senior students at Dakota High School who experienced a pivotal transition in their lives behind a screen. I asked each of these students, who are involved in different activities and have had different experiences, the same questions.
First, I spoke with Brendan Dunn, an athlete on Dakota’s D1 swim team, who’s also a member of the Great Lakes Tritons.
What do you wish you did differently now that you’re a senior?
Dunn: “I want to see if I can max this out” Egregious apple chewing into the mic ensues. “Not be so introverted – not have loser friends like Jay Knapp. I don’t know. It really is just not being introverted.”
What was it like for you transferring from middle school to high school during covid?
Dunn: “Sitting on my computer, in my loft, with the camera on. That’s all we did because we were online.”
Do you think you’d be where you are now if covid hadn’t happened?
Dunn: “No, because if I didn’t have any friends in 9th grade then I wouldn’t have found my friends in 10th grade. I had zero friends in 9th grade.” Logan Miller then appears, and Brendan quickly realizes his mistake as Logan says, “Woooow. Wow. You know what? I see how it is. I’m just going to get lunch.”
“We didn’t talk,” Brendan protests. “Did you even have lunch with me?” Brendan turns back to me and tells me how he didn’t have a single class with Logan.
Did you accomplish what you were hoping to accomplish in high school?
Dunn: “Probably more. I accomplished more – the only thing I thought about it was swim. But now I’m in woodworking too.”
If you had the chance to start high school over again – “no” – without covid happening, would you?
Dunn: “It was hell. No.”
Me: No?
Dunn: “No. It was hell.”
Brendan was pretty insistent on his experience being hell.
What has been your favorite moment of high school?
“Probably state meet Junior year because, like, I did a lot of stuff. I shaved my head off – my hair, and stuff like that . . . It was just fun; it was the high school experience.”
What was life like for you during quarantine?
“Woke up, joined for meetings, during lunch time I’d play video games with my online friends. Then I’d log off, play more games with my online friends, and go to swim sometimes.”
Next, I spoke to Alexa Pardon, a member of Women’s Empowerment who’s plays softball for the Clinton-Macomb Eagles.
What do you wish you did differently now that you’re a senior?
Pardon: “I wish I didn’t give the time of day to people who didn’t deserve it. I let too many people in my life, and held onto them for way too long when they just needed to be… gone.”
What was it like for you transferring from middle school to high school during covid?
Pardon: “Honestly, it was kind of the same, I feel like. It was just more people. It was kind of weird I guess. I went from talking to everyone online and all the friends I made from high school were online. It was just awkward. I could tell everyone went through their awkward phase.”
Me: Was everyone socially inept?
Pardon: “Yeah, like literally everyone; we talked so much online that no one wanted to talk in person. For example, in my 9th grade biology class in first hour, I had a bunch of friends in it. We texted all the time during first semester. Then second semester we all had a class together but we just texted during the class. We could talk, but we just texted.”
Do you think you’d be where you are now if covid hadn’t happened?
Pardon: “I mean, yeah. I expected to have a lot of friends because I talked to a lot of people in middle school. I do have a lot of friends, I am just not friends with who I expected.”
Did you accomplish what you were hoping to accomplish in high school?
Pardon: “No, I mean, there was more I hoped to accomplish. I wish I didn’t hold grudges against people and just let it go. But, yeah.”
Do you think you’d be where you are now if covid hadn’t happened?
Pardon: “I feel like there would be a lot of people I would be closer with if covid never happened. I felt like there was a block that happened right in the middle.”
What was life like for you during quarantine?
Pardon: “Really, really boring. I wanted to see people and I missed it. I got a lot closer with my family during that time, so it was nice.”
What has been your favorite moment of high school?
Pardon: “Favorite moment is probably, obviously, the friends I made during this time.”
Me: God, you’re so cheesy.
Pardon: “I know! What am I supposed to be like? Mmm! My favorite time was when blank and blank. All the friends I made throughout the time.”
Next, I interviewed Gavin Rozak who is a member of NAHS, NHS, and Model UN.
What do you wish you did differently now that you’re a senior?
Rozak: “Uh… I don’t know. That’s a tough question. I wish I didn’t spend all my time taking ap classes because i feel like that stereotypical, like, high school experience. i was always exposed to the same people for every single class because everyone on the ap track was taking the same classes. I’d see the same people. I don’t necessarily regret it because obviously it helped but I wish I would have known what it was like without that.”
What was it like for you transferring from middle school to high school during covid?
Rozak: “It was more confusing coming into 10th grade than transfer into 9th grade because 8th grade and ninth grade just seem like a blur to me. They didn’t seem like two seperate entities until you got into 10th grade because then it was like ‘oh whoa you’re in the big high school building.”
Do you think you’d be where you are now if covid hadn’t happened?
Rozak: “No, not really. I didn’t think I’d be that involved with all the clubs and everytihing. I do NAHS, Model UN, Science Olympiad, and I’m starting to do the eco club. I didn’t think I would be that involved. Some of my friends went to the IA, some went here [Dakota], and some friends drifted. I thought I’d still have everyone I was with in middle school.”
Did you accomplish what you were hoping to accomplish in high school?
Rozak: “Kind of, I’d say I did. I wanted to be genuinely excited to graduate and go to college, and I am, but I guess when you watch those teenage coming of age movies, it’s a totally fictional painting of what high school is. No one experiences the fullness of it. I met people, and I’m happy with the people I met, and I think that’s all that matters.”
What was life like for you during quarantine?
Rozak: “No. I’m a person that’s fueled by being around people, so quarantine was really lame because I didn’t have that. I spent every hour of my day facetiming people because I was very void of it. Everybody was.”
What has been your favorite moment of high school?
Rozak: “I took a trip with my friend Keira, we went to California. we took a trip together and went to redwood national park. it was like, one of the coolest moments of my life.”
If you had the chance to start high school over again without covid happening, would you?
Rozak: “I don’t feel like anything that happened during covid mattered that much. 9th grade isn’t really anything anyway, I guess. It all was a blur. Like I said, 8th grade and9th grade was like a blur and was a year that was just deleted. I guess I’d go back to maybe know what happened but if it changed the events that would lead up to this point then I wouldn’t.”
Lastly, I interviewed Erica McClellan, another member of Women’s Empowerment who still has it out for the staff member who discarded her well-deserved Starbucks.
What do you wish you did differently now that you’re a senior?
McClellan: “Okay, I wish I just took things more seriously. I didn’t hate school but I hated the idea of doing the work. Instead, I just asked people for answers, and I just wish I really took time and did it.”
What was it like for you transferring from middle school to high school during covid?
McClellan: “I think that [covid] helped a lot because we slowly got mixed together because they had the a and b groups. I feel like we slowly got to know each other on a more personal level because of that so I liked it.”
Do you think you’d be where you are now if covid hadn’t happened?
McClellan: “I kind of thought everyone would be friends with everyone.”
Me: Like High School Musical?
McClellan: “Yes! Literally like High School Musical. Like I just thought that – I expected there to be cliques. I’m glad we go to Dakota because the cliques kind of mash together sometimes. I just wish that everyone was really good friends with everyone because that would be so sweet, but everyone is fake. Say one person talks to me – they wouldn’t talk to me if they were with their friends. Like, bro. I’m definitely not where I thought I’d be. I’m definitely not friends with people I thought I’d be friends with.”
Did you accomplish what you were hoping to accomplish in high school?
McClellan: “I wanted to be so much smarter than where I am now. I wish I got better grades which, this year, they’re amazing. I always wanted to do sports in high school, like cheer and everything, and I just never did that, and I wish I did.”
What has been your favorite moment of high school?
McClellan: “Literally meeting the people I know now. And like, seeing them achieve their goals, is amazing, because I’m always so proud of them. I like seeing the people I care about win in life, and I hate seeing them lose, because who wants to do that?”
If you had the chance to start high school over again without covid happening, would you?
McClellan: “100%! I think 100%! I would for the experience of no restrictions because they changed a lot of the rules. But with covid, I like that we got away with a lot of things.”
In conclusion, people said things all along the same lines – that they missed people, that covid sped up the process of losing and making new friends, and nearly everyone agrees that they wouldn’t start high school over again.
It’s great to see how people are bouncing back from quarantine still, and that there is positive despite the negative.
