Six years have gone by since the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic dominated everyone’s lives and changed the way people approached school. COVID attendance and stress levels among students have fluctuated since COVID-19 in 2020. There have been many changes at Grayslake Central in how the school is operated.

When people first found out about COVID-19, everyone assumed it would just be an extra week of Spring Break. However, it quickly became clear it would be prolonged. There were many differences in school operations almost immediately, from school security to counselor appointments. In terms of stress levels, students’ stress swapped from being stressed about school to being stressed about the world and feeling disconnected from their peers.

Many of the changes that happened during COVID are still present in Grayslake Central’s policies and rules because during COVID elearing was enforced online, so students had less schoolwork. As a result of this, students and teachers are allowed to take more sick days as a result of people worrying about another outbreak of a virus.

Desi Tatum, a senior at Grayslake Central, spoke on her opinion about COVID. Tatum said that she prefers the era pre-COVID, because before COVID, she had no worries; she said she “feels like [COVID] is when everything started to go downhill.”

Barry Goldman, Central’s College and Career counselor, was a standard counselor for many years during COVID. He talked about how he wasn’t able to communicate with his students as effectively as he would have in person. Goldman said, “I think the bigger difference was me being able to zoom with them… [it] feels very different from a student coming into my office at the moment.” It was hard for students to communicate their needs for college because they felt like time was not passing.

Cathy Kay, who works in the attendance office at Grayslake Central said, “Attendance has gotten a little bit worse, and I think kids stay home now because they are scared of being contagious.” She explained that seven to eight years ago, if you were sick, most people would go to work or school, but now, if a student has a slight cold, they stay home.

COVID changed many standards from attendance to school work leniency, and we all have learned to take more precautions day to day.