The cancellation of what was supposed to be a Glenbrook Academy of International Studies trip to Germany became just one of the many links in a chain of events of broken plans, shock, and confusion. Eventually, a wild normality took hold— one that comes from experiencing a global pandemic.

In March 2020, English Teacher Hillary Kane was preparing to take her class to Germany, when school was cancelled for the rest of the year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Instead of traveling across the world, she traveled to Google Classroom, posting lessons for her students to complete at home. Missing her students that spring evolved into grappling with how to connect to a virtual class when quarantine seeped into the following school year, Kane said.

“All of the little technology [issues] are what I was worried about,” Kane said. “What was [actually] difficult was how to engage students, assess understanding, and maintain a sense of classroom community through a screen.”

Even though the two-week break from seventh grade excited senior Victor Roza and his friends, about a month in during a Zoom meeting, he realized that the ‘break’ was longer than he thought. The excitement dulled down to anxiousness and Roza missed being around people, he said.

“I feel a lot better when I’m in school [and] have friends in the same classroom as me,” Roza said. “In seventh grade, I didn’t have a smartphone yet, so it was really isolating.”

Although many of COVID-19’s symptoms are physical, the pandemic and the virus itself have had negative effects on mental health, the National Institute of Health said.

When quarantine started, the pandemic seemed to drag on without end, junior Katie Clare Glynn said. At first, everyone was in the same boat during the early pandemic, which was spring of Glynn’s sixth grade. But, as the world was opening up again, Glynn’s quarantine remained in order to protect the health of her family, she explained. This continued quarantine led to her experience worsening, she said.

“All [of] my friends were at school, everyone I knew was out and I hadn’t left my house for over a year,” Glynn said. “[The pandemic] was fine at first, but then it started to go downhill as it became longer and longer.”

In those times of difficulty, Glynn leaned on her family, talking to her older sister and visiting her grandmother. She quarantined with her parents in addition to her three older siblings. In the end, her familial relationships grew stronger, she added.

“[The pandemic] taught me [that] when things get tough, you need to reach out to people,” Glynn said. “Never try to be alone. It taught me how important those connections are.”

In terms of social health, there were fewer in-person interactions for adolescents, but the quality of social interactions improved, potentially because people were more thoughtful of who they were spending time with, the National Library of Medicine said.

The social effects of the pandemic vary from student to student at South. When asked about their current social life, five years since the pandemic started, 27 percent report that they are less social now, 30 percent say they are more social now, and 43 percent of students reported no change since the pandemic, according to a non-scientific survey of 305 students conducted by The Oracle.

The first year Roza went back to school was rejuvenating and energizing as it was also his first year of high school. There, connections bloomed, old and new, as Roza got back in touch with friends.

“I was really good friends with [someone] in sixth and seventh grade, [but in] eighth grade, we did not talk the entire year,” Roza said. “Then I had him in a couple of classes freshman year, and I became really good friends with him again.”

Additionally, the pandemic gave Roza and his peers a common ground since they had all been through the same thing, he said.

“It was easier to talk to people because everyone went through a shared rough experience,” Roza said.

High school was not only a time of growth for Roza socially, but also academically. Roza was apathetic about academics at the start of high school, having emerged from a lax environment in electronic learning (eLearning), Roza said. During eLearning, teachers could be too forgiving with late work at times, which ended up making Roza unprepared for the more rigorous high school workload, he added.

“Going from [a] gentle middle school to being in freshman year where it was more rigorous was a big shift for me,” Roza said. “I struggled a lot in the first few months with a large homework load and teachers being more strict about deadlines. By the time sophomore year rolled around and most of the [COVID-19] stuff was long over, I got a lot better academically.”

Now, Roza has accomplished a lot to be proud of, he said. He is a two-sport athlete and has committed to college, he said. The pandemic played a role in teaching him to maintain not just his grades, but also his connections, Roza explained.

“While it’s bad that [the pandemic] happened, I am glad that I used [it] as an opportunity to grow as a person,” Roza said. “I might’ve ended up better now than [I] would have [if the pandemic had not happened].”

From a teacher’s perspective, Kane is hopeful that if something unexpected were to happen again, the community would come together and find a solution, she said. Even though students are behind when it comes to focus and interpersonal skills after the pandemic, they are also more independent, Kane said. Students have more autonomy when it comes to school work and just overall are more resilient, she explained.

“Things were yanked out from under [the students],” Kane said. “[Things like] eighth grade graduation, senior year graduation, trips to Germany, people getting sick in their household, not being able to see their friends when they wanted to. And here we are looking at each other, laughing again in the classroom, [and] learning with each other. That’s pretty amazing.”