Curious to hear whether incoming freshman, or upper class men, are thinking of taking a gap year.
Not being on campus full time, all the time, seems to me to be a drop-off in quality of education. Would taking a gap year be worth it?
Incoming freshman here- I personally don’t think I’m gonna do it because I don’t have anything to do during a gap year. Everyone is different though- if you have something you really want to do and would make good use of your time, i don’t see why not
I don’t recommend a gap year. There’s no guarantee of a vaccine. If that’s the case, then what? Two gap years? That’s a lot of time wasted staying at home with very little to to. Unlike a normal year, opportunities to travel or do an internship are severely lacking right now.
@HPuck35 College Confidential recently covered this topic in an article that may help answer your question. Read more here: https://insights.collegeconfidential.com/fall-semester-2020-and-beyond-what-are-students-thinking
I have a different take. If I were an incoming freshmen and was assured admission, I would likely take a gap yr during Covid. I agree there is no guarantee of a vaccine, but I would think we’d be in a better place 14 months from now (therapies and just learning how to cope with all these physical changes to activity).
Wouldn’t be the “normal” gap yr with travel and internships, but thanks to the internet, you can take so many interesting courses. Learn to program in several hot applications like Python, SQL, Tableau. Take a deep dive into data analytics. Learn a foreign language. Become a better writer. Get in fantastic physical shape. Etc.
You may never have an opportunity like this again.
From everything I read regrading the various college reopening models, there won’t be too much live stuff going on. Certainly no way near the normal introduction to college for a freshmen.
I wouldn’t stop the process if I was already midstream, but delaying under the circumstances won’t hold you back.
There are threads elsewhere that address the gap year question but I thought a discussion about MIT specifically was warranted. You can learn engineering from just about any engineering school but MIT and other highly ranked colleges are different. It is the personal interaction between other students and professors of high intellect that sets them apart. That interaction will be, at best, significantly reduced it seems to me. I believe that it reduces the value of an MIT education.
The question then becomes what do you do during a gap year and will waiting a year make the MIT educational experience become more normal, and therefore worth it?
There is a Russian phraseologism that perfectly describes taking gap year under the current circumstances: “waiting for the weather by the sea”.
To lighten our mood, here is my fav SNL from a year ago:
My mom is freaking out after reading this from WaPo.
Again, maybe the ICE thing is a blessing in disguise for some internationals.
90% California schools will be online unless infection improves. Will the rest of the country follow this approach as daily cases surpass 70,000?
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/17/us/california-schools-reopening-newsom.html
https://calmatters.org/education/2020/07/california-schools-shut-down-reopening/