Abstract
It was March 2020, a week into teaching online because of the COVID 19 national lockdown and quarantine that a student tells Dr. Christine Marley-Frederick that he will be returning home at the end of the week and must complete the rest of the semester before he goes home; half of the semesters work in one week. Christine later finds out this student does not have access to the Internet because of their rural-country location. A second week passes and a student in Christine’s class who had faithfully turned in his work on time until quarantine still hasn’t shown up in her online classroom. The student seems to have just vanished. He doesn’t respond to emails or texts. Later on, the student’s coach tells Christine the student doesn’t have a computer or an Internet connection in his inner-city housing- project. It takes weeks before this is resolved, and the student is now more than a month behind. Christine gathers online and in phone calls with other faculty hearing the same stories over and over. Professors tell Christine about students camping out in fast food parking lots with free wifi trying to complete their schoolwork because they can’t afford the cost of the Internet at their homes. Students also share their fears of having to return home where it isn’t safe.
Presenters
Dr. Stella Marie RostkowskiAssociate Professor of Business and Healthcare Administration, Business and Graduate Studies, Union College, Kentucky, United States
Details
Presentation Type
Theme
2022 Special Focus—Rethinking the Local: Who, How, Why?
KEYWORDS
COVID-19, Students, Faculty, Diversity, Bandura's Social Learning Theory, Choices
