In March 2020, the world stopped as communities around the world took drastic measures to curtail the spread of the Coronavirus. For many colleges and universities, including Collin College, that meant canceling events, closing campuses, and moving classes online, disrupting the lives of students and faculty.
Then as the world slowly started opening back up, Collin College took the necessary measures to prioritize the health and safety of students, employees, and campus visitors by enhancing campus cleaning, adding new air cleaning technology, offering hybrid, in-person and virtual classes, encouraging social distancing and wearing masks, and adding hand sanitizing stations at each campus.
One thing the Collin College Office of Student Engagement wanted to ensure was that students still had the opportunity to experience everything that the college had to offer, even during the pandemic.
“We felt it was still necessary to give students that sense of belonging to the campus community,” said Andreshia Kelley, an assistant director of student engagement at the Wylie Campus. “Getting involved on campus provides a break from schoolwork and makes college more enjoyable; it provides some balance. And of course, studies show that students who are involved are able to adjust to college better and persist.”
During Fall 2020, Kelley said the college district shifted its focus to online events like trivia games, murder mystery events, and Smart Money bingo. The college was able to virtually host some of the events that were previously held in person.
When the college began offering the hybrid model for many classes, Kelley said it made sure to include “grab and go” events where students could pick up pre-packaged kits.
Some of those events included prepacked s’mores kits for Stress-Free Smores, Stuff-a-Plush (students picked up stuffed animals, stuffing, and Collin T-shirts), Pinterest Party (students picked up supplies and instructions to make their own dry erase calendars), and Cougar Kitchen (students picked up meal prep kits and instructions).
The “grab and go” events were held over a series of days so students could get the items at their leisure and not have too many people in the same place at one time, Kelley said. Any food items were prepackaged or individually wrapped for safety.
“We do plan to continue hosting a few virtual events, and the ‘grab and go’ events turned out to be really popular,” she said. “We will be offering the Cougar Kitchen and Pinterest Party events again for sure. We will continue to take precautions for food handling.”
Students said the college continuing to offer events was helpful in keeping them engaged, especially during the pandemic when socializing was limited.
Collin College student Elise Collins is vice president of membership for the college’s Phi Theta Kappa’s (PTK) chapter. She graduated high school in the pandemic and said she had no prior experience of what college was like before COVID-19. But her time at Collin College has been enjoyable thanks to her professors and the staff.
“It is important for the college to continue events for students to become aware of the opportunities their college has for them,” Collins said. “During my second semester at Collin College, I had a biology class that I was struggling to make friends in. The Student Engagement events allowed me to socialize with my classmates outside of school-related material.”
Collins said PTK also found creative ways to keep its student members engaged by hosting watch parties and virtual games.
“I hope that Collin College continues to acknowledge and adapt to students’ needs. With more virtual components in our learning, we need help creating opportunities to meet people. We can only get more creative in our virtual or in-person social activities.”
Collin College student Ismael Villa said he found it pretty challenging at first returning to campus during the pandemic, but after some time of adjustment it became easier to get into the new flow that benefited his academic growth.
“I felt like it was important to the community and other students to continue student engagement events in the hopes of raising opportunities for students to understand campus life and interact with their fellow students,” Villa said. “I think it is still important to attend events because it builds the community and also builds comradery among the students.”