Dublin Core
Title
Being a Student on March 10th
Subject
Account of Stephanie Czeslowski's First Days of the COVID-19 Pandemic, March 10–12, 2020
Description
Account of Stephanie Czeslowski's First Days of the COVID-19 Pandemic, March 10–12, 2020
Creator
Stephanie Czeslowski
Date
March 10-12, 2020
Language
English
Coverage
Maryland, New Jersey
Text Item Type Metadata
Text
On March 10th 2020, the day before Coronavirus was declared a global pandemic, I had my first moment of realizing that this was going to change the way we do things. I was in class at Stevenson University in the morning and my professor told us about students at Towson University being exposed to Coronavirus over the weekend. My roommates and I would go to Towson every week, so that news was a bit alarming. She also offered that school could possibly be cancelled for the week or moved online. In the middle of my next class, both TowsonUniversity and Johns Hopkins announced that they would be closed for the rest of the week. I asked my professor in my last class of the day if there was a chance we would follow suit and he told me there was a zero percent chance. At 8 pm we got the email saying that Stevenson classes were cancelled for the rest of the week and classes were going to be online for the week after spring break.
I remember thinking that it was just going to be a few weeks and then we would be back at school in early April. I was nervous not so much for myself but for my parents and grandma. In the early stages, I was stressed that the elderly and immunocompromised were most at risk. I still had plans to go to Boston for St Patrick's day, and I still planned to visit my sister in Orlando, Florida. I don't think that the severity of Covid really hit me until March 20th, when Stevenson’s classes were moved to remote instruction for the rest of the semester. It just seemed that after March 11th everything was shutting down. The world was coming to a standstill.
I had called my mom multiple times throughout the day of March 10th. She thought that I had been in direct contact with people exposed, and she was beyond concerned. She called my dad and told him that I had been exposed even though I thought that I hadn't. My parents even tossed around the idea of quarantining me at my Uncle’s home for two weeks. That day was just a lot of uncertainty and trying to convey it to my parents in a way that wouldn't make them worried.
The early days of the pandemic were chaos in trying to find Lysol, wipes, and toilet paper. On the 10th, my mother had asked me to see if I could find wipes while I was still in Maryland. I went to ten different grocery stores and pharmacies and couldn't find any. After finally getting back home, my own family had started to quarantine to the extent that we could before it was required by the state of New Jersey. It was only a hint at what was to come in the following days when stay at home orders were issued.
I remember thinking that it was just going to be a few weeks and then we would be back at school in early April. I was nervous not so much for myself but for my parents and grandma. In the early stages, I was stressed that the elderly and immunocompromised were most at risk. I still had plans to go to Boston for St Patrick's day, and I still planned to visit my sister in Orlando, Florida. I don't think that the severity of Covid really hit me until March 20th, when Stevenson’s classes were moved to remote instruction for the rest of the semester. It just seemed that after March 11th everything was shutting down. The world was coming to a standstill.
I had called my mom multiple times throughout the day of March 10th. She thought that I had been in direct contact with people exposed, and she was beyond concerned. She called my dad and told him that I had been exposed even though I thought that I hadn't. My parents even tossed around the idea of quarantining me at my Uncle’s home for two weeks. That day was just a lot of uncertainty and trying to convey it to my parents in a way that wouldn't make them worried.
The early days of the pandemic were chaos in trying to find Lysol, wipes, and toilet paper. On the 10th, my mother had asked me to see if I could find wipes while I was still in Maryland. I went to ten different grocery stores and pharmacies and couldn't find any. After finally getting back home, my own family had started to quarantine to the extent that we could before it was required by the state of New Jersey. It was only a hint at what was to come in the following days when stay at home orders were issued.
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