Graphic by Tae Hong
Sammy McClintock and Angela Yee
Features Reporters
After December break, COVID-19 cases at Newton South reached an all-time high with 99 reported cases during our first week back. Due to the Omicron variant, cases rose to a pandemic peak. Almost all classes had missing students, and the teacher’s absent list was longer than usual. So many students at Newton South tested positive that the school had to pause close contact tracing.
Features reporters interviewed South students who tested positive during this time to hear about their experience of missing school and time away from friends and family.
“It felt like I had a cold and strep throat. My only symptom was that my throat really hurt but overall [it wasn’t] bad,” said Noah Gonzalez, a junior at South. The difference with this wave of cases is that many symptoms are mild, especially because of the recent booster shot. This could have made students that were asymptomatic less likely to get tested and continue to go to school with a possible positive case.
Another risk is at-home tests because of the chances of a false negative. Some students reported that their at-home tests were negative, and it was not until they took a polymerase chain reaction test (PCR) that they discovered they had COVID-19. Additionally, during this pandemic peak, it was difficult to get a hold of rapid or at-home tests because of the high demand.
In general, teachers were very understanding of the absences and helped students catch up with work while they were sick. “I emailed all my teachers letting them know and all of them just sent me the work that I was going to miss and told me what parts I needed to make up,” said junior Jaray Liu.
Besides catching up on schoolwork, students had a lot of free time on their hands. Gonzalez told us his favorite parts of his isolation: “I liked watching a bunch of movies and chilling with all my siblings because they were home from college and we all had COVID together.”
For athletes, coming out of the isolation period could be a challenge. Anyone who had COVID needed to be isolated for five days before returning back to masked activities like school. Furthermore, in some sports where wearing a mask is not possible, students had to miss ten full days.“I think the thing that felt most different when I got back was when I went to swim. At that point, I hadn’t swum in around 14 days and it was rough. I was very out of shape,” said Liu.
After having COVID-19, people are less likely to be reinfected, especially immediately after returning back to their normal routine. Many students felt less anxious about getting COVID-19 after already testing positive. “I don’t have to worry about COVID as much anymore and I can go hang out with my friends…I feel like I’m pretty safe now,” said Gonzalez.
Overall, schools have been able to accommodate students who have to isolate or quarantine and made sure they could have a smooth transition coming back. It’s clear COVID-19 will continue to affect us, but we have come a long way from the severity of a positive case at the beginning of the pandemic.
