Items

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  2020-05

  The Class of Covid(2020-21) [MISSING MEDIA]

  The picture above that I have chosen for the archive was taken around May of 2020 which is a few months after Covid-19 started spreading very quickly around the United States of America. This was the very start of online school and the era of Zoom. For future readers, Zoom was the company that acted very quickly during the start of the pandemic and made virtual meetings the most convenient and efficient for schools, companies, and friends who could not see each other in person. I personally had many online meetings with my friends when our parents would not let us out of the house in fear of the treacherous Covid that we might bring back with us. In the picture, the very last high school class of my career was over Zoom, and I could not hug or see my close friends, classmates, or teachers before graduating. My private school went from kindergarten to 12th grade in high school, so some of these people I have known for more than 8 years, and Covid prevented me and many other students across the nation and the whole world from having that sentimental last day being able to say goodbye to our favorite teachers or seeing some acquaintances before heading off to college. It is just crazy to think that it will be a very long time before another graduating high school class is forced online or in the near future when online class is just a foreign thought that would baffle kids or young adults that hear about it.
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  2020-06

  Pandemic Protests

  These images from June 2020 were captured during Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests in New York City following the killing of George Floyd. The first image shows City Hall the morning after BLM protests. In this image of a landmark building covered in spray painted cries for change, graffiti depicts the frustrations over the cruel injustices institutions place on people of color. The second image depicts one of many protests during summer in quarantine when New Yorkers came together on avenues, bridges, and squares. Citizens marched and chanted as police followed alongside to ensure protests remained peaceful. These images capture uniquely complex dynamics when people were forced to pursue creative avenues, reinventing social justice movements to come. My time in quarantine was not solely spent on COVID related activities, I also educated myself on how and why many US institutions remain racist, discovering ways that structural change can address unjust attitudes. I read articles written by advocates for the BLM movement and also by conservatives opposing it. In exposing myself to differing mindsets, I was better prepared to engage in conversations with others opposed to change in the hope of educating them on the pressing need for progress. Furthermore, my high school friends and I frequently Zoomed to discuss how our alma mater contributes to racism in both subtle and overt ways. These conversations allowed us to work with fellow alumni, as well as current students, to create a document clearly listing racial inequities within the student body, the faculty, and the curriculum. For each issue that we highlighted, we provided multiple alternatives for how the school could fix the matter in question. While these conversations were unexpected before the BLM protests occurred, they became productive and fulfilling conversations that in and of themselves began to address long held biases, racist representations and undercurrents of injustice within our alma mater’s community and programs.