AMERICUS, Ga. â At first, many schools announced it would last only a couple weeks. A year later, the unplanned experiment with distance learning continues for thousands of students who have yet to set foot back in classrooms.
Comfortable homes and private tutors have made it easier for those with access. Expectations are higher at some schools than others. And growing numbers of students are being offered in-person instruction at least part time.
But students of all backgrounds have faced struggles with technology, the distractions of home life, and social isolation. The Associated Press followed four students on a typical day to find out how theyâre coping a year into the coronavirus pandemic.
Itâs not quite 9 a.m. and Kristen King is on her living room couch, a Chromebook propped on a TV tray.
âItâs been challenging,â says the 17-year-old junior at Americus-Sumter High School in Georgia. âI like hands-on help from my teachers. We canât really see our friends, like our school friends. We canât really socialize with them. We canât really do anything.â
Her Advanced Placement English instructor puts on a recording of a speech President George W. Bush gave on Sept. 11 â part of a discussion about tone in writing and speaking.
Kristen, who is not a morning person, fights off yawns, plays music to help her focus and messages with friends.
âThe first 30 minutes of class, I wonât really be there,â she says.
___
In Española, New Mexico, Javin Lujan Lopez joins a video chat with his football teammates for study hall. Itâs a way for the Pojoaque Elks football players to spend time alone, together.
His first class is finance. When the teacher asks how the owner of a lemonade stand might increase their profits, Javin types his answer in the chat: âRaise the price of the lemonade.â
He moves on to his only other class of the day, physical education. The 17-year-old senior has a camera set up to show him on the porch, where he has a bench press and weights. But when the teacher announces the students donât have to log their workouts, Javin says heâs not even going to go for a run.
Heâll be exercising at football practice, and besides, his friends are online now, playing Call of Duty.
___
Barefoot and eating a bagel, 13-year-old Graciela Leahy settles in front of her iMac for a stretch of nearly six straight hours at her bedroom desk.
Her parents invested their first pandemic money from the government to create separate rooms for Graciela, an eighth grader at Ohioâs Columbus Gifted Academy, and her younger sister.
Gracielaâs mom, Elisa Leahy, is quick to point out the privilege of having such flexibility, noting friends in Columbusâ immigrant community who have more challenging circumstances or primarily speak Spanish had a harder time navigating the transition.
Still, there are hiccups. In Gracielaâs band class â now mainly music theory â the instructor yells at his cat and takes attendance, wondering aloud why a quarter of the class is absent.
Her English teacher is out with COVID-19, so another oversees the reading of âRomeo and Juliet.â A classmate holds a baby brother during history class, where the teacherâs efforts to keep studentsâ attention include a video that imagines Napoleon Bonaparte playing âLetâs Make a Dealâ over the Louisiana Purchase.
___
At 11 a.m. Angelina Mistretta spins fidget toys as lessons stream through headphones, keeping her hands busy in hopes her mind will engage, too.
When in-person school stopped, the expectations that come with attending City Honors High School in Buffalo, New York, did not. On the 16-year-old juniorâs schedule this year are International Baccalaureate literature, AP history, Algebra 2, an IB French class and an IB biology class.
The trouble is, her focus has been affected by anxiety and âa severe case of I donât want to,â she says. A $25-a-session tutor helps with algebra, but sheâs also behind in two other classes.
These days, her mother, Wendy, works beside Angelina on the living room couch. Each day Angelina must complete that dayâs assignments plus one makeup task.
âThereâs definitely a fatigue thatâs setting in for all of us,â Wendy Mistretta said. âItâs exhausting doing this work day in and day out. And thereâs a mental exhaustion when you donât know how or when itâs going to end.â
___
Around noon, Javin begins a marathon video game session. As he talks with his fellow players, his mother works nearby, each wearing earbuds and engrossed in their own conversations.
Itâs her first day back as a payment processor for the state game and fish agency since getting COVID-19 in October. She still has lingering lung problems.
Javin isnât sure what will happen after graduation. He's considering a welding certificate program at the local community college. He applied to universities in New Mexico and Colorado but feels like the pandemic year didnât allow him to put his best foot forward.
âYes, itâs hard to apply because weâve been doing everything remotely and like theyâre just going off of, off of, that and theyâre not going off of, like, actually what you learn because like during remotely, you got some teachers that, like, theyâre older and they just know like, the teaching, they donât know all the new technology and stuff because it is new to them,â he says.
On Monday, the state announced schools could reopen. Javin, who had spent the day snowboarding, made it to practice for the good news.
___
At 12:48 p.m., Kristen begins her fourth and final class, business communication. Like her other classes, it will end before its allotted 90 minutes are up.
The teacher announces a quiz. Students who were watching on their phones scramble to boot up their computers.
Kristen races through the quiz, then gets ready for a skit that is supposed to illustrate a form of distraction and how to control it. Students haven't rehearsed the script they wrote, partly because they canât hold an online meeting on their own using the schoolâs software.
Kristen says she has kept earning As and Bs this year, but itâs been harder.
âI feel like Iâve learned less than what Iâve learned in school,â Kristen said. âThe work is more independent. We really have to learn on our own.â
___
When Gracielaâs science teacher divides students into virtual breakout rooms to help one another finish a worksheet around 1:10 p.m., no one says much.
Graciela uses some of that time to submit late math homework. Teachers are being lenient and thereâs no consequences as long as the work gets done before the grading period ends.
âI procrastinated a lot last year, but I didnât turn anything in late. I just waited until the very last minute to do it,â she said. âBut now, there isnât really the last minute. You can just do it whenever.â
A new type of extracurricular activity wraps up her school day. She has a videoconference with classmates who are compiling quotes into a âDear 2020â video.
Theyâve picked an optimistic submission as a potential ending: âYou didnât defeat me. You helped me grow.â
___
Franko reported from Columbus, Ohio, Attanasio from Española, New Mexico, and Thompson from Buffalo, New York. Derek Karikari in New York and Michael Melia in Hartford, Connecticut, also contributed.
___
More AP coverage of the pandemicâs first year: Pandemic: One Year