By Nathan Schiller, Director of Academic Support

MCNY students are smart, passionate, driven, dedicated. They go to classes, work demanding jobs, and care for their families. Last semester, when coronavirus abruptly changed the nature of their education, MCNY students showed their resilience as well.

Without any training or preparation time, they learned how to attend classes and tutoring sessions via Zoom. Without any precedent, they figured out how to balance essential jobs in health care, social services, and food services with kids at home and CAs to finish.

In the LEC, we are used to students popping into the office asking for a little bit of help.

“How can I brainstorm?”

“How do I tackle this data?”

“How do I prioritize my assignments?”

When everything switched to online learning, we still worked with them, only we were in each other’s living rooms and offices.

One time we were helping a student with her paper as stood in the hallway of the nursing home where she works, wearing a mask. Another time we were helping a student get clarity about her Moodle shell as her kids and our kid said hi to each other via Zoom.

Whatever it took for students to make it through the semester, they did it with resiliency and determination to not let the world stand in the way of their education.

We look forward to the same this term.

Click this link to learn more about the LEC and how we support students’ academic work.