Guilder: 'I hope that this will be a learning experience for both the professors and students'

Beginning last semester, my classes have been the most challenging ones I have had yet. 

Getting accustomed to all online classes, trying to meet deadlines, dealing with personal issues, and staying inside to avoid the coronavirus. 

Why did the professors choose last semester to be the most unreasonable? 

All of my past years at Grambling, professors have tried to reason with the students and work with them if they were going through personal issues. 

So the fact that not only are many professors not trying to work with us, but we’re also going through an entire pandemic is really telling. 

I have lost multiple family members and overcame a sickness myself last semester. 

Not only did I lose my ability to walk I also lost my memory and have been trying day in and day out not to let any of this affect me academically. 

I personally think some of the professors need to go through sensitivity training because they would be livid if their kids were being treated the way they are treating other people’s kids. 

I used to really be proud of the institution I attended but I’m not sure if I can still say that. They have made my university a laughing stock amongst the other HBCUs and ironically Grambling has a lot to work on besides policing how people turn in work. I received a zero on an assignment because I used my phone to turn it in instead of a laptop. 

I did not know that the means of how you turned it in mattered, I thought that if you still tried and completed quality work was the point of it all. 

My friends who attend other institutions have been telling me how their professors have been working with them and making sure they don’t feel like their concerns go unnoticed. 

Now with black students at predominantly white institutions already feeling like their needs aren’t being met, it is important for them to feel recognized in a world where they can easily go unnoticed. 

One of my closest friends attends the University of Alabama and the way they were handling the pandemic last fall was absolutely absurd. 

They were still making them attend in-person classes, people were still eating inside of the cafeteria and they even had a designated quarantine area on campus for students who have been diagnosed with the virus. 

Imagine how all of the black students feel who go to that university. Probably forgotten, not attended to, and left behind. 

There is no reason why black students at a black institution are getting their priorities pushed to the side by professors who claim to advocate for students' education. 

It makes me feel like this is all a game of charades and the students are the losers every time. 

I hope that this will be a learning experience for both the professors and students. 

This situation should allow them to learn from their mistakes and grow within themselves. 

Just in case something like this happens in the future people will knowingly have the tools to prepare for disastrous situations and receive better outcomes than they are now.

– Jaida Gilder is a senior mass communication major from Las Vegas, Nevada.