Due to recent events concerning the COVID-19 pandemic, Virginia Beach City Public Schools (and schools all over the country and the world) have transitioned to a virtual learning model in an effort to salvage as much of the educational experience as possible.

Everyone in Virginia has had to adapt to the closing of schools and the changes being made to the school system. This includes high school freshmen.

Freshmen have already experienced a transition from middle school to high school which increased the intensity of their studies and provided them with a bigger workload. Now they are transitioning again; this time to online classes for the duration of the fourth quarter, which is proving to be another challenge.

“By not being in the normal work setting [that school provides], I feel less motivated to actually do the work,” said freshmen Jess McMillan. “Being surrounded by everything else at home can be a distraction as well.”

There are concerns nationally that the modifications to the way students are being taught around the country may have long term effects on student’s high school careers. The main concern being that students will be behind in their learning when they return in the fall. Staying on top of fourth quarter assignments can help alleviate that problem to some degree.

“Online learning [may] make it so that when we go back to school next year a lot of us will struggle with keeping up with the workload that the teachers give us in school,” said freshman Sophia Watkowski. “[This is why] it’s important to monitor the online platforms that your teachers are using to make sure that you keep up with any work and announcements.”

Transitioning to virtual learning is reducing the amount of enthusiasm that some freshman initially had upon entering high school.

“Online learning makes me feel less motivated to do the work,” said freshman Colleen Valentine. “I think that as we start learning new things online I will fall behind because I won’t want to do work that I don’t understand.”

As freshmen navigate through this second major transition, the consensus appears to be that they prefer going to school in the traditional sense than doing online learning.

“Virtual Learning is hard right now, but hopefully everyone can use this to become better learners and appreciate what we had at school before,” said Valentine.