Five years later – how the CSB+SJU campus community is moving forward post-pandemic

After the end of March, we officially passed the five-year anniversary of the first COVID-19 shutdown at CSB+SJU. On March 13, 2020, CSB+SJU students were sent home to prepare for online classes that began a week later, and the rest is history.

During the pandemic, students spent their time in many different ways — some chafed against the structure of zoom lectures, some binge-watched TV shows and others struggled with sickness, health concerns and anxieties that come with living through a global shutdown.

Now, we have returned to “normal” in many ways — but how have we changed since Covid wreaked havoc on our old lives? We spoke with three members of the CSB+SJU community about how they’re seeing our campuses move forward over half a decade after the initial closure.

Almost all current students didn’t experience the first year of the pandemic at CSB+SJU, with the exception of fifth and sixth years who were on campus in 2020. Regardless, this is an opportunity to reflect on the effects of the pandemic still felt today — from academic, to athletic, to social.

In general, academic achievement suffered following the Covid pandemic. A study published in the National Library of Medicine found that the learning deficit after the pandemic was comparable to deficits suffered by students who experienced a major natural disaster like Hurricane Katrina. This same study found that as the years progress, it becomes less likely that students will be able to recover this lost ground unless significant interventions are made.

Strategic Communication Studies professor Julie Lynch is now more optimistic that most of this recovery has been made at CSB+SJU. She’s been teaching on campus for 22 years and said that as of 2025, she is noticing students return to what she describes as “pre-Covid” academic and social habits after a few years of feeling the effects in her classes.

“At the time, it was just so much harder for students to talk to me and each other in and out of class,” Lynch said. “But that was the immediate after. Now, I see things picking up differently and I’m relieved. I walk down the hall and I can hear my class talking before I even get to the room.”

Lynch said that group academic projects were one key thing that has improved since the years following the start of the pandemic, when previously it seemed that students struggled with collaborating effectively with others immediately after the shutdowns. Now, she finds her students are interacting more like they used to, which could be indicative of this “recovery” necessary for a return to full academic success.

In addition to academic impacts on the student body, athletic programs across the country are still feeling the lasting effects of Covid. Athletes who competed during the spring of 2020 and the 2020-21 school year retained their eligibility due to the high impact. Covid had on their seasons. This means that the 2024-25 school year was saturated with these athletes, making the competition even more intense.

This was especially true at CSB+SJU, where fifth- and sixth year seniors made major contributions across many of the teams. SJU sixth year track and field athlete Kevin Arthur said he wanted to leave a legacy at St. John’s while continuing his track career.

“I chose to use my extra eligibility because I did not want to leave SJU with a ‘what if’ moment,” Arthur said via email. “I have had great success with the track program at SJU, so I decided to use it as an opportunity to inspire the younger track athletes.”

While Covid was a primarily poor experience with many negative long-term impacts, athletes like Arthur show the upsides that the shutdown has today. Fifth- and sixth-year seniors can step into leadership roles and serve as examples for younger students, as well as provide teams with more depth and skill development.

The challenges of Covid also taught us many lessons. Working on projects and training alone forced students and student-athletes to work on being proactive and practicing a higher degree of responsibility. Arthur had his own thoughts on the lessons learned during Covid.

“I am glad I went through the experience of Covid during college because it taught me how to be independent and focus on my schoolwork without any outside accountability,” Arthur said via email. “During Covid I had to keep myself accountable with my schoolwork as well as my training for track. Fast forward five years now, I have been consistent with my training since then and graduated with my degree in Global Business while accumulating distinctions in my sport.”

Student athletes like Arthur show how we can learn and grow from difficult situations.

Hard work in the face of hard times has led him and the entire SJU Track and Field team to great heights, including several national championship appearances and even the title of national champions in the 4×100-meter relay.

Training with a team is a large aspect of any sport, and to have that taken away was a huge blow to athletes as a whole. This is also reflected in the impact on student’s social lives on college campuses.

One of the most significant repercussions of the Covid pandemic was the effect on social interactions and mental health. Isolation did no favors to the extroverts among us, and even introverts could feel the effects of being cooped up inside for so long.

CSB fifth-year Gabbie Ward started on campus in the fall of 2020, when classes were on a block schedule over zoom.

“It limited me from meeting other people in my initial cohort,” Ward said. “I felt that I was only truly able to connect to the people who lived next door to me in Regina and a few others that I met while walking around outside. I have always been more introverted, but Covid made me realize how much I enjoy meeting new people and experiencing genuine face to face human interaction.”

Ward said that despite some of these detrimental effects, she does think that the community came out better on the other side following the pandemic.

“While Covid was socially limiting for the most part, I think it made people think outside of the box on how we could interact with one another,” Ward said. “It highlighted the persistence and dedication for human connection and a sense of community that the CSB+SJU students pride themselves on.”

It may be true, then, that some things never change — community has persisted throughout CSB+SJU’s long history. Why should a global pandemic end that tradition?

Covid is certainly not over, and the negative effects and tragedies that resulted are without question.

Many of us will be forever changed, whether we experienced all or parts of the pandemic here on campus or were just exiting the worst of it when we enrolled.

Living through the height of the Covid pandemic was (and still is) no small feat.

If the stories from some of our campus community members are any indication, there is always a chance to bounce back, and probably even change for the better.