Simone: “In recent months our sense of responsibility has increased”

Between a rush from the bed to the desk to connect in time for the roll call and between repeated clicks on the link to access the video lessons, our school life continues but not in the way we had expected or desired. The days go by, as well as the months in which I see my classmates and professors through a screen and hear their voice through the audio of the pc or mobile phone: distance learning, which in recent months we thought was only a fleeting moment in our school career, is slowly taking on an increasingly prominent role, to the detriment of the traditional face-to-face teaching method, but it is also the only way to continue with studies even in a moment of emergency like this.

Since the covid-19 emergency began, it has been recurrent to think about what the situation would have been like if this pandemic had broken out 40 years ago but also 15 years ago, when technological progress and digitalization did not guarantee at least one computer or a high-tech mobile phone for each of us and still did not allow us to live in such a virtually connected world.

Personally, in misfortune, I feel like a rather lucky guy as the pandemic has happened at a historical moment when we have the means to face it and, scholastically speaking, coexist with it. Furthermore, thinking of those who, at my same age, from another part of the world cannot have a right or access to education or any of my peers who, nowadays or decades ago, have other priorities such as being forced to go to war or flee from it, endangering his own life for the uniform he wears, like poor Piero di De André, staying at home, to protect his own and others’ health, still having an education, albeit atypical , but guaranteed, it seems like a less demanding effort to me.

Despite the unusual modalities of this “School without school”, the constant that remains in our days is the “mad and very desperate” study, in search of keeping up with the program, often forced to chase it like a mirage, indolent in the third canto of the Divine Comedy, forced for eternity to chase the banner of ideals not pursued in life.

While you may be able to take an extra peek at the book during testing or hide behind your name icon during a lesson, the study is still required and in the most intense periods of the year it can lead to a high level of stress, aggravated by the fact that one is forced to remain within the walls of the house and you don’t get a chance to free your mind not being able to devote to leisure activities such as sports, theater, courses or more simply out with friends. This is to say that the commitment and dedication in studying are still and rightly required, in the face of those who think that this is wasted or wasted time and intend to extend the duration of the school year until late summer.

Another aspect that I was able to see during the distance learning it is the sense of greater responsibility that I have noticed in many of us. How easy would it have been to turn off all the devices, silence every whatsapp group and not enter every lesson anymore? Instead I found in myself and in many companions a personal growth, something that, beyond the grades and maturity that awaits us, pushed us to continue studying, although there were conditions to take a long break from studying, meeting the requests of teachers, who are also forced to reinvent themselves and adapt like us students, in making the lesson engaging even through a screen, because it was right to do it, behaving as in an ordinary school situation, although it is not.

Certainly the “physical” class is very missing, the jokes to make a lesson lighter, the shared pre-verification anxiety, the interval spent together with sharing a snack or hours of study in a group, elements of sociality and sharing that undoubtedly do grow and are part of our daily life, aspects that especially us fifth grade boys want and hope to return to live as soon as possible to enjoy the end of high school, of a path that saw us enter adolescents and leave almost men and women.

Personally, however, I believe that in a moment like this, the much contested DAD is not the worst of all evils, rather than returning to the traditional presence in the classroom gagged by masks, forced to grueling hours and forced to use means of transport full of people. The goal is therefore to grit our teeth and continue to face school as serious and mature people, with the hope of returning to class, hopefully as soon as possible, loaded with an experience that has changed and improved us in various aspects. , thus returning to hear not only the discomforting sound of the alarm clock but also the more pleasant one of the interval bell.

Simone Liceo Linguistico S. Quasimodo Magenta (MI)

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