How COVID has been Effecting Rock Canyon in the Fourth Quarter So Far

Students sit in a half-empty classroom after returning to a full in-person schedule. Students returned March 22, and the school has already experienced quarantining students. “It seems like every time I come to class more and more people are online,” Aiden Macarthur 23’ said.

by Calvin Edlund, Reporter
May 4, 2021

Monday March 22, students returned to school full in-person. This controversial decision was met with some backlash because many people felt as if it was too early after spring break to return since many families had just traveled and that COVID would just spread again around the school.

How Staff and Students Feel About Online, Hybrid, and In-Person School.

“That’s hard to answer because I feel with the epidemic it’s probably smarter to stick to online school, but I notice that kids really struggle when they’re not in person. Personally I think that whatever happens, it shouldn’t be hybrid; it needs to be either full online or full in person. If I had to choose, I would say online learning because it’s safer and with the epidemic you really can’t be too safe.” Spanish teacher Derek DeNileon said.

“I’ve been doing much better in person but I feel like with how many people are getting quarantined that it might be better to go online. It seems like every time I come into a class, more and more people are attending virtually. When I was quarantined it felt a bit overwhelming at points, especially coming back because I had a lot of makeup work to do in a few days. To me right now, I think we need to go online.” Aiden Marcarthur 23’ said

The school board in conjunction with the Tri-County Health Department made this decision because they felt that our ability to learn would be helped substantially, and most students would say that in this aspect, it worked. That being said, if schools can’t stay in session for more than a month, is it worth the risk?

A lot of people saw this coming with the halls being twice as full and the lunchroom becoming a breeding ground for sickness. Also, a lot of students don’t try to prevent the spread of COVID, even if it would have been possible with over 2,000 people in one building.

An email sent April 8 to parents about the possibilities of returning to online school stated that there was about a 150-200 rolling quarantine amount. Even with that number coming from Principal Andy Abner, it seems more likely that the numbers were likely a bit higher.

The DCSD website says that there are about 400 people in quarantine as of April 9. These numbers are apparently up to 48 hours behind but still paint a better picture of what many people seem to witness at school.

In general, the vaccine released to the public made people think COVID would be over before we knew it, but it seems that we might experience the effects of it for a bit longer than many people expected.

Rock Canyon returned in-person again for what they hope to be the last time. School gets out in a bit less than a month now, and it’s possible that we will make it all the way through the rest of the year.

That being said, nobody knows how many cases we will have going into this final stretch, but if it’s too high we could return to online school again. From what has happened so far it looks like we will most likely not go online again, but only time will tell.