Making New Friends During a Pandemic

There is a saying that I heard once –  “You never know what you got ’till it’s gone. The truth is you know exactly what you have though, you just never thought you’d lose it.”

For me, it was losing the chance to make new friends and meet familiar faces that became the epitome of that phrase. The pandemic changed everything!

Like many of you, I went into isolation before I got into college; I lost the chance to meet friends and teachers new and old. I lost the chance to explore and expand my boundaries which I’d slowly begun opening up to at the time, and it pushed many of the things I wanted to do back many months.

At first, I was happy. Not having to wake up early for school. Class assignments are all due on Sundays. Not having to meet with people. (I’m not the biggest social butterfly, don’t judge me.) Not having to eat cafeteria food. Sign me up! And for a while, it was great; I was able to work at my own time, help around the house more, get my personal life in order, hang out with my family, etc.

But eventually, the joy of being at home got numb, and like many people, I found myself tired.

Tired of seeing the same few people every day. Of wearing a mask whenever I went outside; or waking up to virtual meetings. And it only grew more tiring and irritable when I found out my next year of college would be like this. TWO YEARS of doing nothing but talking to someone behind a screen?

And it certainly didn’t help that I couldn’t talk to any of my high school friends, either. So much for keeping in touch! And there’s only so much you can do or learn about somebody else over video chat or a text message. So needless to say, even as a not-so-social butterfly, I feel as though I took being around new people for granted. It’s still something I take for granted, but I am willing to admit I’m at least trying. And soon I might not have to try as hard through a computer screen to meet a new face.

Right now, we’re seeing the distant light at the tunnel’s end. Sooner or later, COVID will be a thing of the past and we’ll hopefully be able to look back on it and see where we’ve come from since then. And sooner or later, we’ll be able to meet people and one another face-to-face. But that doesn’t mean we can’t meet one another right now – there are always different ways to get involved with classmates, clubs, and your campus. And for someone like myself to say that, it takes a lot. So I suggest reaching out to new people, make friends with your peers, and just remembering to stay safe during those moments.

By NVC Student Alex Rocha

To learn more about NVC clubs and organizations, go to our Student Life page

 

The Little Things Mean so Much

You really start to miss the little things when it’s been taken from you. You start to notice things you silently appreciated when you had them and how empty it feels without it. When COVID-19 hit and schools transferred to being remote-only, I thought nothing of it. In fact, I was almost excited at the thought of waking up in the comfort of my home to only walk like three feet over to my computer to attend class, and I’ve realized how much it’s impacted my school life.

It’s been almost a year now of living through this pandemic, something I thought I’d only read about in history books. All of my classes have been remote only and there’s something I have to say. Although we’re trying our best to stay safe from the virus and protecting not only ourselves but others, there is an emptiness in watching faces on a screen instead of in person.

You can only know so much about your fellow peers or your community behind a camera. It took away one of my favorite things about a new class, and that was meeting new people. I learned a lot about others by talking to them face to face, experiencing new things and ideas, and especially just making new friends. I can’t help but feel like I have taken it for granted now that I don’t have it. I am looking forward to things opening up when it’s safe for everyone to live life like normal again.

But even through all of this, remember that there are still ways to get involved with your campus and your peers. Reach out to them, reach out to the school and attend some of the events. Stay updated with your community and remember to stay safe. If we all team up to stay masked and keep our distance, the sooner we’ll be able to enjoy the little things that mean so much to us.

By NVC Student Gina Briggs

STEM Careers Pandemic Proof

STEM workers are in demand! Engineering and STEM-related jobs will take precedence in the employment industry through 2029 according to recent data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

STEM — science, technology, engineering and math — professions are expected to increase 8% between 2019 and 2029, compared to just 3.4% for all other careers. Even more impressive, the median annual STEM wage is $86,980 a year, compared to $38,160 for all non-STEM jobs.

Also WalletHub.com ranked four Texas cities in the top 60 of its list of the Best Cities for STEM jobs. Although San Antonio ranked No. 58 on the list that was released last month, Austin ranked No. 4, and its proximity to San Antonio is beneficial.

This is good news for engineering students in Northwest Vista College’s new partnership with UTSA called TATE which stands for Transfer Academy for Tomorrow’s Engineers program. It allows NVC students to co-enroll at both institutions and take engineering courses taught by UTSA and NVC faculty. Upon completion of the NVC component and an associate’s degree in hand, students will continue courses at UTSA to obtain their bachelor’s degree in any of the six UTSA engineering degree programs, which includes Biomedical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, and Civil Engineering. UTSA also has a partnership with Lone Star College, a community college in Houston.

Students interested in the TATE program are welcome to attend a virtual meeting on Thursday, Feb. 25 at 3:30 pm. To sign up and get Zoom details, go here.

What are some of the benefits of TATE? First, students will be able shave off about $8,800 from their tuition and fees by attending a community college first.

Second, students in this program will be the envy of their peers at summer internships. Many of the summer jobs are from companies that pay about $18 an hour – more than doubled the current minimum wage in Texas. Just in the Lonestar State, there are nearly 100 companies that offer summer internships and many are in the San Antonio area, such as U.S. Air Force, Valero Energy, H-E-B, Intel, CPS, USAA, IBM, Accenture, and Proctor & Gamble. After graduation, UTSA says the starting salary for engineers averages about $60,797.

Third, this joint program opens the doors for many students who don’t have the resources to purse an engineering degree. NVC students who are on financial aid can participate in the AlamoPromise program, that along with other financial resources, can end up making college free.

Finally, the partnership allows students to strengthen their math skills to get calculus ready for their final two years at UTSA. With NVC’s strong math department and tutoring program, it can transform students who started in lower-level math development courses and get them calculus ready in their first two years at NVC.

To learn more about the program and its requirements, which includes being calculus ready, visit the NVC website at https://www.alamo.edu/nvc/academics/tate/