Freshmen vs. Graduate Students: the UGA COVID-19 College Experience

College students across grade levels discuss COVID-19’s hold on their social and academic lives. Despite the college experience that they may have, some worry that all students are at risk of facing mental health challenges at the hands of COVID-19.

College freshmen define college by COVID-19, by the restricted guidelines and lack of social interaction that has surrounded them for the entirety of their college experience. Seniors and graduate students have a college history to look back on, yet the pandemic has left them feeling like newbies all over again.

The mixture of hardships amongst grade levels shows just how much COVID-19 has impacted the social and academic lives of college students at UGA.

“I kind of just felt like I was like taking 10 steps backwards, almost in a sense of like, it was freshman year all over again, and I didn’t know anybody, but this time, like, I was so restricted to meet people,” said Brenna O’Brien, a graduate student in the professional school counseling program at UGA.

O’Brien is one of many older students who has reverted back to their freshmen-selves, trying to create new connections in the middle of the Zoom mayhem.

Samantha King, who faced the transition from being an upperclassman to entering graduate school during the pandemic, also said how the coronavirus forced her to create a new social agenda.

“Just getting to know people on zoom helped with my like social anxiety of oh i haven’t been around people in a while i can be away from people for a few more days so it kind of forced me to like be social in a way,” said King.

King isn’t the only college student who faced mental health struggles during her pandemic education. A study from the Journal of Medical Internet Research found that many college students attribute their increases of anxiety and stress to their socially-distanced lifestyle.

On the other hand, freshman Kristin Smoyer has found that COVID-19 has not changed her habits greatly given that she has only ever experienced college during the pandemic.

“I’m actually a freshman, so it hasn’t really affected me much because generally when I come here there is still space available for me to study,” said Smoyer.

Unlike graduate students who are seeking to alter the patterns that they have created for themselves over four years, freshmen like Smoyer are familiar with the COVID-college lifestyle. One aspect of this lifestyle includes visiting the socially-distanced, and therefore less crowded Miller Learning Center.

Maggie Blanton, the assistant director of services for the Division of Academic Enhancement, has many worries regarding the lack of precedent that freshmen students have when it comes to college.

“So like your, you know, first year college was one way, and then another student’s first year college experience is such a completely different way. So I think the feeling of being robbed or your expectations not meeting up with reality, I think that’s really difficult,” said Blanton.

Blanton said she worries for freshmen, because she knows, while they are unaware of a COVID-free college experience, COVID-19 has taken its toll on their social life, specifically their mental health, just as it has for upperclassmen like O’Brien and King. A study from PLOS ONE found that social changes like social isolation from COVID-19 increase the risk of moderate to severe anxiety and depression in college freshmen.

UGA has taken some steps to address this rise in mental health concerns in the presence of the coronavirus. One particular step involves UGA’s Student Care and Outreach, a department that has become the first communicator to student’s who face COVID-19 head-on.

Despite some efforts, students across campus and across Zoom classrooms are still facing the social and academic effects of COVID-19.