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A Pandemic, a Hurricane, and Earthquakes: How Much Can Puerto Rico's University Students Take?

Westside Gazette - 7/22/2021

Puerto Rico was just beginning its shutdown because of the coronavirus pandemic when the life of former college student Jaffette Rolon suddenly changed. He found himself unemployed.

"I was out of work for three to four months. I eventually had to leave school to be able to pay my bills in order to survive," said Rolon in an interview.

"At the beginning of the pandemic, I had to move back to my parents' house who live an hour away...There were too many family members in one space without peace and quiet or a stable internet connection. I had to drop out." he said.

When Puerto Rico began shutting down because of the pandemic, university students like Rolon struggled to adapt to virtual school. In 2019, public and private school enrollment in Puerto Rico had already dropped 44 percent since 2006, leading to the closure of 265 schools. Hurricane Maria, earthquakes, and political instability had already hit the region hard.

In August 2018, the government of Puerto Rico reported more than 1,400 deaths in the aftermath of category 5 Hurricane Maria that ravaged the island in the fall of 2017. A string of earthquakes hit Puerto Rico beginning in December 2019. That included a magnitude 6.4 earthquake that struck the island on January 7, 2020, causing extensive damage and widespread power failures. Then, in 2020, the pandemic threatened an increased dropout rate on the island.

With pandemic shutdowns pending, professors scurried to adjust their curriculum to an online environment. "[We] had a week to adapt to class online," said Aurora Santiago Ortiz, a professor at the University of Puerto Rico, who wrote her dissertation on dismantling the education system. As stated on her website, she "explored how students and community partners negotiate their collaborative relationship, produce non-Eurocentric forms of knowledge, and resist neoliberal austerity measures that threaten Puerto Rico's public university and overall socioeconomic well-being."

Students expressed concerns as well. "It's like I'm basically teaching myself, like I'm studying on my own. We don't have the teachers there to explain stuff to us and most of the professors are not aware that we also have problems," said University of Puerto Rico student Fatima Garcia.

Other students expressed similar disappointments: "I had expectations when I was in high school that I would get a university experience, to be there in class and hang out on weekends. But that was completely taken from me, and it's all online. You don't feel connected to the professors or the students. It's not the same," said Genesis Santiago, a student at University de Puerto Rico, Mayagiiez.

Students faced a host of issues ranging from unstable internet connections to lack of access to electronics.

"Since there are places where there was no connection to wifi or telephone, many students felt their future could be interrupted as their classes could not be completed," said Julio Santana Marino, provost of Albizu University, Mayagiiez campus in San Juan.

Compared to the U.S. states, in 2019, Puerto Rico ranked as one of the highest numbers of households without internet sub- scriptions (third to only New Mexico and Mississippi).

According to the Center for Puerto Rican Studies, 65 percent of school closures have occurred in rural areas as opposed to 35 percent in urban areas.

"The internet connectivity is not the same in San Juan as it is in Morovis, which is an area of mountains," said Provost Marino.

The solution is to "improve wireless communication in the entire town; especially in the mountains. Communication in the mountains is not as good as in the bigger cities that have more infrastructure," said Pedro Resto, a professor at the Industrial Engineering Department at the University of Puerto Rico, Mayagiiez campus.

Lack of stable internet can lead to missed assignments, leading to lower grades.

University student Fatima Garcia has encountered issues with completing her assignments after repeated misunderstandings caused by internet connectivity issues. "The electricity in the house goes out, and they don't understand it, and they get annoyed and sometimes we miss out on work for reasons that are out of our control," she said.

According to the Puerto Rico Youth Institute, around a quarter of the island's children Continue reading online at:

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