I was trembling inside the car, not knowing what to expect. It’s my first time stepping my feet on one of the country’s most prestigious universities. Butterflies were freely flying in my stomach. Thank God my urine has not descended yet, or else it’s Armageddon.
The year was 2016, and we were about to attend the Philippine Conference on New Evangelization (PCNE). It was a 2-hour trip from Taytay, Rizal to University of Sto. Tomas (UST) in España, Manila. About fifteen of us – students and teachers – were, somehow, exhilarated by this experience. The perk of being a school representative is that you’re excused from class. Never mind the physical exhaustion of sitting the whole day listening to talks and symposiums, I needed a pause from the mental torment that face-to-face classes were rendering.
PCNE paved the way to explore the then-405-year-old university. It was the first time seeing the arch of the centuries and the Quadricentennial Pavilion (QPav), facing in front of España. The campus was surrounded by trees and college buildings and fast-food restaurants. Inside QPav, the misty air raised my hair. Thank God I have a jacket at the time.
My teacher studied philosophy there, that’s why he served as our tour guide on the last day when all the activities were over. We took pictures at the tiger and those gigantic letters at Plaza Mayor – memorabilia still saved on my hard drive. Lucky for us, we were able to enter the museum inside the main building, filled with artifacts and rich history. We stopped by Santisimo Rosario Parish for a prayer.
I envisioned being a Thomasian, imagining what it would be like a student there. Will I allow myself to be devoured by the pressures? Will I be able to qualify there? Questions kept coming in, some of which I’ve already forgotten.
Three years after, the desire to be in UST waned a bit because I was gunning for a slot in the University of the Philippines (UP). Nonetheless, I applied to UST in July 2019, two or three days after they announced the UST Entrance Test (USTET) application on Facebook. How quick it was to submit the requirements. Before the month ended, the test permit was already printed.
I didn’t have any problems applying to Ateneo and La Salle either. But UP College Admission Test (UPCAT) was horrific, if not outright disappointing. I forgot to ask the principal to sign my 2×2 picture, thus rejecting our papers; my test permit wasn’t released on the scheduled date, only to be discovered at the dark corners of their office weeks later. I was irked conversing with them to the point that I wanted to cancel my application.
In the end, I flunked the test, failing to reach its meteoric standards.
“It’s like as if poop was dropped on your dreams. A slap on your face. An insult to your intelligence. It’s as if the UPCAT is the validation of your greatness and then it told you that you were nothing but a dumb loser. It’s as if you felt worthless and undeserving,” I wrote last year.
Fortunately, I passed through UST’s rigorous process, offering me my first program choice, journalism.
The decision was rendered on January 28, 2020, a time when I’m frowned because of how our program for our teachers blew up. I screamed in excitement when the results poured in because I was under the assumption that I’m going to fail.
I guess the Lord is bad to you sometimes and good to you sometimes.
Four hundred ninety-eight days later, here we are. Freshmen year is over. What happened?
COVID-19 nearly shattered our lives – and redefined it
Oh hell, yes! Look at what COVID-19 did to us. It singlehandedly crushed the opportunity of experiencing freshmen year. No matter how giddy we were before, the virus is simply too infectious to be ignored.
All dreams remained dreams; all hopes remained hopes; and all grievances remained grievances.
Absent was the first day’s festivities, where cars would jam through the narrow roads of the campus, and students would get to know each other in a confident and over-the-top fashion. The professors would have started rolling the gears even though that’s the time when introductions were the norm. And organizations would court newbies to join them, outlining their activities for the year.
No one expected how the pandemic would turn out. Add that to how top officials mismanaged in the early days of COVID-19, and you have a life tantamount to living in hell.
It was absolutely difficult to swallow the fact that education would push through online. My previous schools weren’t really dependent on it, utilizing the traditional physical setup. The latter was both effective and ineffective, though there are other factors to consider.
I, myself, am a big fan of face-to-face classes, but at times I got worn out to the point I just wanted to float up in the air. Mathematics was my greatest challenge; P.E. was my biggest fear.
To be fair, the online setup was not of anyone’s liking. It is the only viable option on the table right now. Whose parents will have the courage to bring their children to school when the enemy is both powerful and invisible, with the capability of taking your life in a brutal manner?
I believe that the Department of Education (DepEd) doesn’t want this, for sure. The Commission on Higher Education (CHED) doesn’t want this, for sure. If there are alternatives, I’m sure they won’t resort to this. But there aren’t. None.
If there’s a silver lining from this experience, it’s that we were forced to learn outside the realms of traditional methods, pushing us – young and old, freshmen and sophomores, professors and deans – to confront the intricacies of today’s technology and think outside the box.
Of course, this can’t last forever. As CHED announced last month that flexible learning is the ‘new normal’ of education, my blood pressure skyrocketed. The reliance on online platforms is simply an admission that they won’t stringently push to return to traditional face-to-face classes.
There are many faces of online classes, which I exhibited at least once in the 291 days we were students. Happy, check. Sad, check. Angry, check. Disappointed, check. Satisfied, check. Validated, check. But behind every feeling was a story worth the attention, the love and the affection.
“Despite numerous testimonies from students on how the remote setup affected their physical and mental health, CHED managed to stand its ground on an unacceptable proposition,” I wrote.
I may be accused of misleading people about what flexible learning truly is. Still, I strongly feel that the essence of the statements of CHED’s Chairman, J. Prospero De Vera, is to toss out calls for face-to-face classes because they are being pushed by what he perceives as government detractors.
A college student’s life has been altered, disrupted and near-shattered by COVID-19’s wrath, but it has come to redefine it in ways none of us expected or even imagined.
Sailing through unchartered waters
In early September, as I began embarking on this journey, my communications professor asked us his expectations for his class, and his reply to my answer struck me up to this day: “I’m ready to be with you in sailing through unchartered waters.”
Sailing through unchartered waters.
I’ve already gotten the gist of what he said, but I had to search it online to verify my understanding. And when I did, I was right.
It was a never-ending sailing on unknown waters throughout the academic year, going through destinations that were dark and daunting. But despite the virtual setup, the hardships didn’t dwindle and the pressure never subsided.
I was lucky to have friends who imparted their trust in me even if we haven’t met each other personally yet. They were my rock – half-solid, though, as they went through personal challenges – to which I could hold unto if things got messy.
And their presence has been more critical than ever, especially that subjects were expedited because of time constraints, making it arduous to study and comply.
Spanish – a subject that needed to be taken twice for A.B. students – petrified me since learning a language amid the pandemic was mind-blowing. Who would want to talk about pronouns and conjugations online? The accessibility of Google simply tempted us to rely on it, slipping an opportunity to know the beauty of the language by heart.
With physical interactions prohibited, videos were the go-to of professors. Instructional videos, speeches, exercises – you name it! I’ve used Adobe Premiere almost every week, trying to grasp this very complex application, to submit requirements. Sometimes, I would laugh at my submissions because either my voice was hoarse, my dancing skills were worthy of being a laughingstock, or my speeches prompted viewers to scratch their heads.
Documents are trying to squeeze in my hard drive’s limited storage. Ten-page papers or twenty-slide presentations or two-sheet spreadsheets invaded my laptop, as did anyone else.
Researches stretched our scarce knowledge – and patience – as we prepare to become the nation’s fact-checkers and context providers. My professor in Readings in Philippine History pushed us over the edge to produce high-quality outputs worthy of her perfectionist standards. Her comments on our works were frank, if not savage.
And who can be salvaged from creating infographics and then post them on Facebook? As a shitty drawer, I struggled to conceptualize designs, sometimes leaving the workspace blank for an hour. That’s why I relied on others during group works because they have the capacity and experience.
Probably the spice of the academic year was the extracurricular activities. As my friend noted, orgs were the only thing that kept running his blood. But since academics gave me the thrill of my life, I would say that orgs further sent shockwaves to my body.
These groups taught me more about leadership and responsibility, both of which are considerably improved over time. I met people who valued their positions so much, doing their utmost best to deliver results, even if roadblocks came their way. They were my inspiration, my guide and my model. Because of them, I tried – and will always try – to bring out more than my capacity, squeezing whatever I have in me until the last drop.
It was fun sailing with them, though despondent because of missed opportunities to be with each other. From hosting to live-tweeting, the tasks were daunting and herculean but beneficial for my personal portfolio, which I may use for finding a job in the future.
There are many faces of online classes, which I exhibited at least once in the 291 days we were students. Happy, check. Sad, check. Angry, check. Disappointed, check. Satisfied, check. Validated, check. But behind every feeling was a story worth the attention, the love and the affection.
Where do we go from here?
To all the interviews I’ve conducted this year, there is a shared sentiment that online classes is their modern-day passion. Like Jesus, they’re carrying a heavy cross on the way to an unforgivable world.
“Nung first half (August-October), there’s enough allotted time to do tasks,” one interviewee said. “Pero ngayon, nagkaroon ng some obstructions along the way, some students na until now ‘di pa na naco-contact. Mahirap lang this half (November-December) dahil biglaan ‘yung lessons ngayon at maghahabol for the finals.”
Another interviewee said, “Alam mo naman na ang hirap ng academics before the pandemic itself. But when the pandemic actually started, ang daming complications. We really needed to incorporate online learning. Paano ba magturo using Zoom? Paano ba magturo using Google Meet? Not all of us have the capacity to streaming. Other blockmates of mine have actually moved to provinces and hindi [stable] ang internet connection.”
In short, enough is enough.
The government and educational institutions should craft a policy for a safe implementation of limited face-to-face classes to ease the pain of students who are still in the process of transitioning to this setup. One year after we experimented on this medium, it is safe to say that many can’t catch up. While there have been learnings, they are not substantial and considerable enough.
No one expected how the pandemic would turn out. Add that to how top officials mismanaged in the early days of COVID-19, and you have a life tantamount to living in hell.
And while professors did their duty to open the gates of knowledge to their students, the mind won’t simply accept everything wholeheartedly.
“Online class is not a joke, it’s actually more difficult,” one UST professor told Manila Bulletin. Through his group’s research, he said that class size should be significantly lower to cope up with the struggles of the setup: “We have identified a university that instead of decreasing the number of students because of these online classes, they did the reverse. But, this is contrary to what research should tell us. This is because it’s more challenging and we are also expected to be on call when the students need us.”
I’m still thankful to the Lord for this blessing, no matter how laborious this may be. Nonetheless, I pray to the Lord that He’ll consider enlightening the public and the government so that we can gradually return to our everyday lives.
The online academic year has been quite a ride, but I don’t know if I ever want to take that again.
The Edj View 
HBD kuya”The Thomasian” EJ.!
LikeLike