What to do during gap year with COVID19

[pillowfighty]

Hello,

I took a gap year starting January of 2020 in order to gain some experience and save up some money for moving costs related with transferring from my community college to a university. Unfortunately, with the current pandemic going on and my state being on lockdown, there are no volunteer/job opportunities and my school pushed back their date of return to May 1st. I was considering going back to school for a late semester session but most classes are cancelled, unavailable, or are online and I just missed the deadline about a week ago.

I am wondering what I can do to be productive and use my time wisely during this pandemic that will continue for quite some time. I also had a summer research internship lined up at a university but no word yet on whether it is cancelled or not. I was thinking if summer sessions are in I could grab an EMT license in order to get a job in the medical field and some experience, but that still leaves me with 3 months. I just heard back from ScribeAmerica today and the location I was applying to recommended me to a different location, I've never had that happen before so I'm not quite sure what to think.

Any help and guidance is appreciated

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[AnonymousDoctorGuyPerson]

Tutoring online is great income and can still be done during this pandemic. I will note, there is a lot less tutoring for standardized exams available since a lot of prometric stations are closed and so people are less focused on preparing for said exams but still plenty of action tutoring for college coursework.

On top of that a great time to work on a hobby or skill you've always wanted to, such as learning a new language or some other subject, working on a hobby that can be done at home (something like polymer ceramics or an instrument).

I live in NYC so I'm on quite the lockdown myself so here's an example of what I'm doing: I'm tutoring as much as possible since I can't go to work. I'm deep-diving into improving my Spanish, learning/reading up on finances to better prepare myself in the future, creating some miniature sculptures for funsies, and working on some VR app development I've not had the time to focus on for the last few months. I picked up my old harmonica for a little bit, but then I really started to feel quarantined haha, something about playing the harmonica and being trapped in your apartment gives me the willies.

Good luck!

 

[AnonymousDoctorGuyPerson]

In NYC, you have 100,000 homeless kids in school system. They are likely short of everything, including workable laptops and tablets. I suspect many of us have old ones lying around that may be useful to them. Lastly I have no idea how to actually see these kids, for tutoring or whatever else. Be proactive on Facebook, with your local town, city, school district and find something. If not, try to start something. Keep a journal or even post on SDN.

This is a national crisis, indeed a world crisis, doing anything to help, even indirectly is of service

Spectrum here is rolling out free wifi hotspot devices, as well as free access to their pre-existing hotspots. Schools are also trying to get tech to households that don't have it (laptops, tablets, etc). My roommate is a school teacher here in NYC and she says this rollout is, unfortunately, moving quite slowly. Half her students live in shelters, many of whom with limited internet access or the necessary devices to access the internet. And don't even get me started on the kids stuck in abusive households. Definitely a lot of things people forget about, and a lot of opportunities to help those who can really use it. For example, a lot of these students do actually have access to cell phones with texting and a lot of impromptu tutoring, welfare check-ins, etc are being done via text.

 

[deleted962722]

Tutoring online is great income and can still be done during this pandemic. I will note, there is a lot less tutoring for standardized exams available since a lot of prometric stations are closed and so people are less focused on preparing for said exams but still plenty of action tutoring for college coursework.

I second the online tutoring! I am an online MCAT tutor for a test-prep company and our company has actually seen a great increase in demand/interest post COVID-19 outbreak as students are home and have more hours available to study.