COVID-19 is a rapidly spreading disease affecting millions of students and staff worldwide. Many people are trying to get back in the hang of things, but students all over the U.S. are missing weeks at a time from school because of COVID-related absences. Upon return, students struggle to catch up.

“I would get so frustrated and anxious,” sophomore Cara Helton said. “There were all these due dates and I was getting behind while everybody else was in class actually learning.”

Humble ISD requires students and staff with COVID-19 to remain home until 10 calendar days after symptoms begin or until they receive a negative test and are symptom-free for 24 hours. As of  Sept. 24, there had been 3,724 total cases reported in Humble ISD since school started in August. 

As these students stay quarantined at home, their classmates haven’t missed a beat as they continue to learn. The students in isolation fall behind and have difficulty trying to catch up. 

Helton tried to do work posted in Schoology while she was home. But after an hour or so, she would zone out. She often got dizzy and her head hurt. During one test online, she said she got so stressed she was shaking because she did not know the information.

“It was hard to do the work and pick up on different units,” Helton said. “I missed the class expectations, I didn’t know how things were supposed to work.”

Humble ISD has implemented support for students who are absent due to COVID-19 with the option to keep up with schoolwork via remote learning if they feel well enough. It will be up to teachers to ensure that students can continue their education at home, as well as make up for lost knowledge and skills. 

“Most teachers care more about your health than your actual work,” Helton said. “It was nice, they were patient with me.”

There is so much students and teachers do not know about the constantly changing dynamics of this pandemic. What they do know is that thousands of students all over Humble ISD are coming back to school worrying if they’re going to be able to catch up.

Junior Daniel Spear, who missed the month of February with COVID last year, also missed two weeks in September with it.    

He could only eat soup or liquids that went down easy, and he spent most of his days sleeping. His parents and two sisters had COVID as well. 

He struggled both times to get his work done at home and was grateful for his teachers’ patience.

“Don’t worry about it,” Spear said. “Keep track of your grades and just get it done when you can.”

Talking with teachers is key, English teacher Jessica LaBello said. 

“Ask for help,” LaBello said. “People don’t know if you’re struggling if you don’t say anything.” 

LaBello also added to use your resources in Schoology to catch up as well as going tutoring as much as possible.

“[Students] have so much support at school, whether it’s through their counselors or their principals or their teachers,” counselor Tim Hurlbert said. “As educators we wouldn’t be here if we didn’t enjoy working with kids and want to help students. If there’s things that we can do to make things easier we want to do that.”