Since the beginning of the pandemic there have been many questions regarding our future as human race, some of which have still yet to be answered clearly. It was clear that Covid would affect us socially given that we were dealing with an airborne virus which had no cure. With the limitation of “in person” communication and the pandemic beginning of the year in 2020, it was unclear how students would be continuing the rest of their semester. Quarantine left schools closed delaying the graduation period for students, especially ones who were transitioning from middle to high school and high school to college. The solution that seemed to be the most practical was to hold online schooling, forcing many students to get comfortable doing all of their work on a computer instead of the usual in-class experience. To some, this transition may not seem that drastic, but studies have shown that covid has negatively affected students all over the world. As we are progressing past the pandemic era we have to consider what changes have been made due to covid and understand how these changes have affected us so that we can take the right steps to recovery. One question that we should ask regarding these changes is “How has Covid affected education?”

        Although schools did not close completely, for some students the beginning of the pandemic marked the end of their school year. The move from in-class to virtual learning was very abrupt and took time for both students and teachers to get used to. There were a few problems with virtual learning such as lagging with video calls, students not logging into the correct classes, students not having access to a functioning microphone, or students not having access to a computer or internet access at all. According to the World Economic Fourum children from low-income households, children with disabilities, and girls were less likely to access remote learning due to limited availability of electricity, connectivity, devices, accessible technologies as well as discrimination and social and gender norms. This was also the case in countries where there isn’t much access to computers or the internet in households in countries such as Ghana, Mexico, and Pakistan. Although there have been issues with virtual learning, there are still a number of schools that offer online based learning  or a hybrid style based learning due to covid. 

 

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  After the quarantine lockdown I went back to work and started to save up to move downtown for a while just to get a new feel out of life. The city was a more vibrant and fast pace environment as compared to being in Decatur although Decatur was not at all far from the city. I had been going to the city to network and hang out for about two years before I decided to move there so by the time I did move out there I already knew exactly what I wanted to do differently. I got acquainted with a distant friend I had met in the city, Ron, who was an event curator and was interested in making a comeback after covid had shut almost all events and parties down. I asked if I could DJ at his event and he did. I didn’t know it then but this would be the start of my career as a DJ in a way. 

  Ron was having his annual Halloween party which I had been two the previous year so I knew there would be a bunch of people there. It wasn’t the first time I had DJed at a party but it was the first time I would be DJing for Ron and I wanted to make a good first impression and I did. My set was so good they asked me to do two sets at that one party. For the next couple of months Ron put me on every single party he curated. This helped me expand my connections and soon I would be DJing for other people as well. This was a big turn around for me because it felt like it all happened out of nowhere. I had been DJing since the end of 2018 but it felt like it was so hard to get people to take me serious as a DJ until the pandemic. The pandemic went from the worst possible thing that could’ve happened to 2020 to being the best possible thing that could’ve happened to me. I was happy because it felt like I took advantage of opportunities that actually helped move me as an artist.

  Unfortunately, through out all of the change I was experiencing, my best friend Lawrence had also been going through changes but of different sorts. I could go into how close I was with Lawrence but that would be an extremely long story in itself. To say the least he was the only person I called my best friend since I was in the 3rd grade. On February 14th of 2021 my best friend past away. This was to date the hardest thing I had ever been faced with in my life. I hated the world and I started to involve myself with certain things that were not in anyway good for my health. I was still DJing parties which was making things a lot harder for me to cope with loosing my best friend. I started looking a lot of things differently, especially my future. Not long after that I lost the life of another close friend I had named Chrys, who was like an older brother figure to both me and Lawrence. I felt like I was dying in a way trying to cope with these deaths until I moved from the city back to Decatur and started to get booked for out of state shows. From April of 2021 to November of 2021 I had been DJing, making music, and traveling all while trying to figure out where I really stood in the world. My mom, being one of the only support systems I had left, encouraged me to go back to school which is how I winded up here.  

After hearing the worst news possible towards the end of February 2021 that covid would soon force the U.S. the go into lockdown, everyone started to prepare for the worst by the month of March. At the time I was working at the Guess store inside of Lenox Mall. It wasn’t the best job but given my interests in fashion, I was just happy to be there. I will admit it wasn’t the most interesting job. I was working anywhere from 25 to 30 hours a week, but it definitely kept me busy and out of trouble, plus I had recently gotten a raise at the start of the new year. Although I did enjoy my job, I was not at all worried of being laid off as a result of covid. In fact I was kind of excited because I thought it would just bring me closer to my friends since I would have more time to hang out instead of having to work all the time. 

By the middle of March me and almost everyone I knew had been laid off from their job temporarily due to covid. People say the idle mind is a dangerous place to be left in, for me this was starting to be very apparent. I thought I was going to be spending most of my time with my friends but covid turned out to be a lot more serious than I anticipated and most of our parents wanted us to stay in doors. So I decided to start watching new anime series such as One Piece, JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, and Prison School, as well as playing a new zombie game I had gotten called Days Gone. I tried to stay in doors for the first week of quarantine but playing zombie games and watching anime for hours on end just did not satisfy me enough to keep me inside. I then decided I would start going to the park to skate every morning, and I did. It felt good to get out the house and catch some fresh air. Soon my best friend, Lawrence, would start coming with me to skate at the park and in a way it was us rebelling against the restraints of covid. That felt good to us, so then we started to break even more quarantine rules. We were going out to eat, skating in the city, hanging out at each others house, and overall just enjoying the absence of the general population. It wasn’t long until we were all called out of lockdown. By April I had started back working at Guess like nothing had ever happened. 

Like most people, I first heard about covid at the end of 2019 but I did not see it as a threat to my way of life until the beginning of 2020. There had been news reports of the virus spreading in China but I thought it would be no different than the other cases of viruses that had grown to be widely spread across the world. While other parts of the world were experiencing this new disaster I was having the time of my life before I realized the seriousness of this situation. I had been going to a lot of parties with my friends during the holiday season and I was very excited for 2020. To me it was just going to be another year where I get to meet new people, experience new places, and grow with the people I loved being around the most. There was also so many activities and events in the city for young creatives such as myself before the pandemic which I had just started learning about and taking advantage of.

I specifically remember being at a new years party at the end of 2019, and as far as I can remember this is the last time I would enjoy myself and the world without the idea of covid. There was a venue that held a lot of raves and live performances in the city called The Bakery. It was my favorite place to go and have fun with my friends and it had inspired me to get into EDM and rave styles of DJing. I didn’t know it at the time but new years of 2020 would be the last time I ever set foot in that venue. By the end of January of 2020 it was becoming more and more apparent that covid 19 was not limited to just Asia. There had been more and more reports showing up in new countries around the world, each being closer and closer to the US. Around the beginning of February The Bakery had announced that it would be closed indefinitely due to covid 19. It was not until then that I took the pandemic seriously and deep down it felt like I had been robbed of something. As time progressed it felt like the pandemic only continued to rob me of more and more things such as my job, being able to go out, being able to show my face, being able to DJ events, etc. By the March of 2020 I felt miserable and I would have done anything to be able to relive the year of 2019, and sometimes I still do feel that way.

My name is Shawn Windom. I am 21 and I am from Decatur, Georgia. My mom is from Kenya and my father is from Chicago so I am a mix of two different cultures. My interest are mainly in music, fashion, technology, and media. I started playing instruments when I was 10 years old with a trumpet in my elementary school band class. I then continued to play until I was 13 which I then started taking piano lessons. I continued to learn music theory though my piano teach as well as pick up other instruments in the process. I am now a Dj, recording artist, and producer. I mainly enjoy house, edm, rap, rnb, and alternative music. Some of my favorite artist include River Tiber, Mall Grab, Robb Banks, Travis Scott, and Kaytranada. I have been fortunate enough to Dj shows in Atlanta, Orlando, Miami, and Los Angeles. I plan on using music in a lot of different ways in the future such as continuing to develop as a Dj and be able to travel the world through that as well as making music of my own.