By Logan Meriwether, student reporter
Masks are essential to keep you safe from COVID-19, officials say, but are they hindering students’ abilities to learn?
Dr. Dena Walker, a math professor at Northwestern, said she takes the safety of her students seriously. Walker makes sure that her students have their masks on properly every day. She also believes masks can diminish the ability for some of her students to learn.
Walker enjoys getting to know her students, but having masks on has made getting to know them difficult, she said. She can usually read students’ facial expressions when they don’t understand something – especially when it comes to a shy student who doesn’t like to talk during class.
Having masks on makes a lot of her students not want to ask questions even when they don’t understand what she is teaching, she said. When teaching, her voice is muffled because of her mask, so students in the back of the room may have difficulty hearing what she is saying, she said.
Walker has to provide notes that are more detailed when she writes on the board in the front of the class, a process that takes up more class time, she said.
Walker also drinks several cups of water every day. With her mask on, she noticed that she was only drinking one cup per day. When it is hot outside, Walker said she struggles because she has had less water. As a result, she has experienced headaches.
Walker has resorted to wearing a face shield when she can be six feet apart from students or other teachers. She drinks more water and is able to breathe more freely, all while staying safe, she said.
Olivia Yandel, the assistant director of the J.R. Holder Wellness Center, said she has had more difficulties in her classrooms and in the wellness center because students and patrons have to wear masks.
Patrons must wear a mask to enter the wellness center, which students and community members use.
A number of community members are having a hard time following the university’s mask order, and workers in the wellness center are constantly having to remind them to put masks and wear them properly, Yandel said.
Yandel and Richard Burdick, the director of the wellness center, have had to make calls to individuals that have memberships at the wellness center, explaining to them that they must wear masks or they can no longer workout.
Yandel said it is frustrating when student workers have to tell adults to put their masks on and wear them properly.
“For the most part, we aren’t having any health issues with people coming in and wearing a mask properly through their whole workout,” Yandel said.
In the classroom, it’s hard to get a “read” on students, Yandel said. Not a lot of them talked or asked questions even before wearing masks, so it is harder now to gauge facial expressions, Yandel said.