By: Angelina Anderson
This fall Roosevelt along with many other universities is requiring students to get the COVID-19 vaccine (Moderna, Pfizer, or Johnson & Johnson) in order to return to campus. Roosevelt is recommending students get vaccinated by Monday, July 19, 2021 inorder to be fully vaccinated in time for the start of the Fall 2021 semester. This is because students will only be concerned fully vaccinated two weeks after their final dose of the vaccine. All Roosevelt students and employees who plan to attend face-to-face classes, utilize on-campus resources, or regularly be on-campus are required to be fully vaccinated and submit proof of their vaccination to the university. Roosevelt plans to return to mostly face-to-face classes in the Fall of 2021, although students and faculty who plan to remain off campus are not required to be vaccinated. For more information about the Roosevelt plan to return to campus and the vaccination requirements, visit the Roosevelt blog. Many individuals are wary of getting the COVID-19 vaccine and are uncertain about the new requirements to have it in order to return to campus. Personally, I found it helpful to read up on the vaccine beforehand and work to understand the science behind the different vaccines available. The CDC has some wonderful explanations of the side effects, clinical trials, and general information about each of the three COVID-19 vaccines available. This article by the New York Times gives a more in depth explanation of how the Moderna vaccine works, alongside diagrams and text explanations, this article helped me to better understand the mechanisms behind the vaccine. I also found it helpful to hear from people I know who had already gotten the vaccine, knowing their experiences helped to make me more comfortable and confident when I myself went to get vaccinated. Getting vaccinated is a very personal choice and can be a very difficult decision to make. In this situation where Roosevelt students are required to be vaccinated to return to campus it is important to read up on the vaccines so that you can feel comfortable and confident when you do go to get vaccinated.
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By : Emily Wielgus
Living in downtown Chicago was an exhilarating experience compared to living back home and traditional college dorms. Coming from a small town in Indiana to one of the biggest cities in the US was a huge change of environment. I lived on campus in the dorms when I was a freshman in the fall of 2019 until the fall of 2020. Roosevelt’s dorms are a great experience with modern living situations and furniture, gorgeous views of the city, and bathrooms within each shared suite. Roosevelt’s benefit of being right downtown allows us students who live within the top 15 floors of our glass building to see breathtaking views everyday. My favorite part of living on campus was being surrounded by beautiful scenery, being so close to everything on campus, and having countless businesses and restaurants within walking distance. An academic benefit was having all of my classes within the same two buildings of the Wabash and the Auditorium Building. This benefit from living in the dorms made it very easy to get to my classes early, have additional time to study, and be able to grab a snack within the cafe if ever needed between classes. Having an older brother who went to two different traditional colleges gave me a behind the scenes look of how traditional college dorms look. Typical college dorm life of living on a big campus with several old buildings and old dorm rooms was definitely not the dorm life experience that Roosevelt provides. We have the benefit of having modern rooms, private bathrooms within the suites, and everything on campus like classes, the gym, the library, cafeteria, and many more within two buildings. In comparison to traditional dorms, they are not as modern, have community bathrooms within the dorm buildings, and amenities like the library, gym, cafeteria, and academic buildings are spread out throughout a series of buildings on their campus. My freshman year I planned on living in a quad room where four girls shared the same dorm with the overall suite having multiple people living within the different rooms. I was excited to meet new people within Roosevelt’s community so I assumed that living in a quad would give me more opportunities to meet friends on campus. There were a large number of students living within the dorms my freshman year so my plan did not work out and I ended up living in a single dorm my first fall and spring semester. The privacy of living within a single dorm was nice but I felt somewhat isolated since none of my 6 other suitemates would talk to each other. This put a damper on having close connections within my suite since friends from my classes who also lived on campus would tell me about how their suites were super close with each other. Within the Fall of 2019 and the Spring of 2020 guests were allowed to be within your dorm so I was able to bring my friends who didn’t live within my suite to my room. This aspect was a nice experience that made up for my suitemates having no connection. Overall living within the dorms was a great experience but once the pandemic began dorm life was not the same. I was living in a double dorm during this time so having a roommate made the experience feel a lot less lonely but we felt like there was barely anybody on campus. Being within a campus that felt so empty was a different experience especially when it felt like I was safer staying within my dorm. I hope the new rules and regulations of the pandemic will allow RU students living within the dorms to have a great residence life experience during their college journey! |