COVID-19 and Tufts’ response plan were always going to adversely impact academic opportunity and learning as well as student social life, including student organizations and programming. It was evident that life at Tufts was not going to be normal this semester; we are going through a once-in-a-century pandemic. Therefore, manystudents —at least 735 — are attending Tufts remotely and manyothers are taking leaves of absence. From my personal experience, Tufts has done well to accommodate students studying remotely from an academic perspective: Professors have generally been understanding of time zone differences and technical challenges, recordings for lectures are available and exceptional pass/fail has already been approved.
Nevertheless, Tufts’ students and administration have failed at creating an inclusive social and extracurricular environment for many of those students studying remotely. I am seven hours ahead of Eastern Standard Time (EST), meaning that a student organization meeting or an administration-run event at 7 p.m. EST is at 2 a.m. for me. In order to maintain my mental health and a healthy sleep schedule, I cannot attend those meetings. Other students with larger time zone differences have it even worse, as they are unable to attend events that are planned during the afternoon.
When studying remotely, many international students, myself included, have agreed to bypass some aspects of social life at Tufts and to make sacrifices to get the most out of the semester academically. However, it remains the duty of our peers and the Tufts administration to make accommodations to support us and keep us integrated within the community. They have not done so. All it takes is one glance at the Jumbo Digest email, sent on Sept. 13, to notice that all general interest meetings listed for the week of Sept. 14, excluding Tufts Quidditch, but including the Tufts-organized Student Organization Fair, began at 5 p.m. or after, with no alternatives announced in the email for students who cannot attend due to other commitments or large time zone differences.
Many international students come from countries where they do not have the same opportunities to participate in extracurricular activities at Tufts. One of the ways that privilege is institutionalized is when opportunities are withheld from a group of individuals, usually on the basis of something that they cannot control. When an international student studying remotely cannot attend a student organization’s meeting, they are being excluded from a potential opportunity to make powerful, long-lasting relationships with people they share interests with and to learn from their peers. These effects are magnified when thinking about first-year international students studying remotely, as they have not gotten the chance to build friendships and become involved in extracurricular activities at Tufts.
Ask yourself the question of whether you learn more in class or from your friends and extracurricular activities. Then ask yourself a follow-up question: Would you be okay with giving up the social and extracurricular aspects of your college experience?
Student organizations and the Tufts administration must make a conscious effort to create accessible alternatives for students studying remotely to participate in clubs and university-sponsored events. This could be done through recording club meetings or other on-campus events for asynchronous viewing with participants’ consent. It could also be done by holding some events and meetings earlier in the day, during lunch period or in the morning, or by having professors and teaching assistants help facilitate study groups for remote international first-year students to collaborate with students on campus. It would also be very important to publicize these opportunities and make them more readily available beforehand.
Changing times for extracurricular activities, recording club meetings and student programming events and making the extra effort to reach out to international students studying remotely could be an added inconvenience for people on campus. Nevertheless, as students who believe in inclusivity and diversity, it is our duty to one another to make sacrifices to support and include our peers. Inclusivity and diversity are not just catchphrases that should be thrown around; they are integral to any resilient, powerful and supportive community that believes in every one of its members.
