Items

• 
  05/12/2022

  Image for Exhibit. (DO NOT CURATE)

  Image
• 
  2022-03-28T08:40

  Covid the Great Destabilizer

  My personal experience
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  2021-06-01

  Museum Recovery Expected to Take Years Due to Devastating Financial Losses, New Survey Reveals

  The American Alliance of Museums report highlights financial problems and some of the more negative long-term impacts resulting from COVID-19 such as reduced overall net revenue for the institution, lower employment numbers, and lower average salary for their staff members.
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  2020-04-16

  Gagosian Furloughs Part-Time Staff and Interns as Covid-19 Impedes Business

  All galleries felt the immense economic pressure of shuttering their doors. There was uncertainty and furloughs or imminent possibility of losing ones job was a looming presence especially in the spring of 2020. Even international blue-chip galleries like Gagosian were financially struggling. Those that lost their jobs were 

The article discussed job loss - whose jobs - and what this means for the art world in the present and in the future. Other methods of main tenting financially during the pandemic included furloughs and salary cuts where the percentage was determined by how much someone made per year.
• 2021-10-17

  The Covid Disconnect

  The story and my experience are an example of the many ways in which the pandemic affected individuals in different ways. It goes without saying that each person was impacted in varied ways due to Covid-19, however, not all of them were either explicitly negative or an outcome that is easily defined as being either beneficial or harmful. During the height of the pandemic in the United States, I was employed as an Assistant Warehouse Manager in Green Bay, WI. My workload and responsibilities were already a little taxing, but once things got in full swing with Covid they became even more so. I went from working an average of 60 hours a week to over 75. This was mainly due to about a third (or more) of our employees being out of work due to quarantine-type measures or actual illness. This went on for months at the beginning. Many weeks out of that time period there were as few as about a dozen of us running three shifts in a warehouse that normally employed roughly 40 workers. Also at this time, my wife became unemployed because her place of employment shut down. Others around me were losing their jobs in droves and facing financial hardship. But due to my position and the nature of the job, I had never had more job security and we never faced any kind of financial difficulties. On the contrary, during the entire pandemic, my wife and I never went without or struggled. This gave me a surreal feeling and one that I almost felt guilty for living through. Aside from some minor changes in my daily life, I barely noticed any personal changes due to Covid. All in all, it was an extremely odd time to live through; the pandemic wasn't necessarily bad for my wife and me, but I know it was for countless others. And that made it all the more strange.
• 
  2020-07-15

  PSC-CUNY Protest at BCC

  For my primary source, I selected a photograph I took at a protest held in front of the Bronx Community College campus on July 15, 2021. The Professional Staff Union of CUNY (PSC-CUNY), the union for the faculty and much of the staff throughout CUNY, organized the event to protest the BCC administration June 26 decision to lay off 36 experienced adjunct professors at the end of their 3-year contracts, even though that their departments recommended that they be rehired. People in the picture include BCC Faculty, staff, and students, as well as those from as well as people from Hostos Community College, who came to support the BCC community and were facing similar cuts. The day was very hot, but I was nervous to the subway because of COVID, so I rode my bike from my home (about 24 miles roundtrip). I was pretty sweaty and probably stinky when I arrived. It was the first time I had been to campus since March 10, when, on my way home from school on the subway, I learned CUNY was moving online. (The campus itself was locked, but we stood in front of the gate on University.) It was also the first time I people from school in person since March; I was so happy to talk to them. It was weird to be with a group people, after months of isolation, but we all wore masks and stood six feet apart. Cars honked their support as they drove by. I selected this source because I want historians of the future to understand how the pandemic hit higher education and the connections among the COVID crisis, social justice movements, and education. Although I went to larger marches after the murder of George Floyd, I believe funding for CUNY is a form of social justice. I was angry that politicians and school administrators were giving lip-service to the phrase Black Live Manners, while cutting funding and jobs from CUNY. BCC’s students are overwhelmingly Black and Latinx, and many studies show that a CUNY education is one of the best schools for supporting social mobility, helping people support themselves and their families. Firing the adjuncts not only meant the teachers lost their income, and, sometimes, their health insurance, but that BCC students would be in larger classes; larger classes mean faculty have less time to devote to each student, which can make it harder to for students to succeed. While I understood enrollment was down and the budget from the city and state would likely be smaller because of the economic toll of the pandemic, I thought there were other places the administration could cut costs. (Such as their own salaries). I want historians to see that the faculty and staff of CUNY fought for what their students deserved and the connections among CUNY, social justice, and New York’s economic recovery. I also want them to see how people approached protests, which require gathering together with other people and often chanting or shouting, while in the middle of a pandemic that required people to stay apart and cover their mouths.
• 
  2020-04-17

  COVID-19 and Social Justice

  From the article: The COVID-19 pandemic is a health and mental health crisis, to be sure. But it is also a crisis of social injustice, inequitably affecting vulnerable and marginalized populations that include, among others, individuals who earn low incomes, or are incarcerated, homeless, in foster care, over 65 (especially those in long-term care facilities), people of color, or undocumented. Social work practitioners, educators, and policy makers are working to address the needs of these populations despite the unpredictability of the virus’s secondary impact on systems.
• 
  2020-10-17

  「コロナで収入途絶え」自殺目的で放火か　４人死傷（2020年10月17日）- "The drop in income due to Corona" Suicidal arson 4 people killed/injured (October 17, 2020)

  Personally, when I watched this news, I felt like a lot of people can relate to this man. He felt depressed most likely due to loss of income from COVID-19, and just could not handle the reality. However, he did kill and injure people during his suicidal arson, which is of course wrong. What is worse is that he is alive while he involved other people. 「コロナで収入が途絶え死を意識した」ということです。 おとといの夜、東京・北区の木造アパートの自室に灯油をまき、ライターで火を付けたとして、放火の疑いで逮捕された自称・金田一淳悦容疑者が、調べに対し「新型コロナで収入が途絶え、自殺したくて火を付けた」と供述していることがわかりました。 この火事で、２階に住む小野豊さんが死亡したほか男女３人がケガをしています "I considered of killing myself because my income was cut off in Corona." On the night two days, a self-proclaimed Kazuyoshi Kaneda, who was arrested on suspicion of arson for sprinkling kerosene in his room in a wooden apartment in Kita-ku, Tokyo and igniting it with a lighter, the investigation found that he stated, "Income is gone due the new Corona. I lit a fire because I wanted to commit himself". The fire killed Yutaka Ono, who lives on the second floor, and injured three men and women.
• 
  10/04/2020

  Jennifer Rehling Oral History, 2020/10/04

  This was an interview done with a nurse and the impacts she has seen in in work, life and community.
• 
  2020-09-26

  COVID-19 2020

  The story I am submitting is about people losing their jobs and homes during this pandemic. It is important to me because I know some people who have lost their jobs due to this and they were struggling to pay their bills, wondering when their next meal was going to come, even the parents who had to quit their jobs because schools had closed down so that was another stressor during this time.
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  08/23/2020

  Kelsey McIntyre Oral History, 2020/08/23

  Kelsey McIntyre lives in Walnut Creek, California. She discusses how the pandemic caused her to lose both of her jobs but says she is grateful that her state and local government responded the way that they did, or things could be much worse. Kelsey feels that she has grown closer with her family who are in various places across the United States, and that the increasing prevalence of technology such as Zoom makes it possible to communicate with them. Kelsey talks about the impact of COVID-19 on the LGBTQ+ community by the cancellation of Pride Month events and the LGBTQ+ community being at increased risk for exposure by those who are most vulnerable. Kelsey talks about how her partner works in news and she relies on them to get updates about what is happening, as well as checking the news on her iPhone She also talks about how she has learned to establish boundaries with her partner and that being together frequently can be both good and bad. Kelsey believes that masks will be mandated indoors a year from now, at least where she lives, and is optimistic that people in the LGBTQ+ community are actively participating in preventative measures.
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  2020-03-25

  Covid Diary- Caleb Lincoln

  Personal diary entries from 03/25/2020 to 05/01/2020