It is hard to believe but it has been five years since the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign campus essentially closed after spring break. During the spring 2020 semester, spring break was officially from March 14th-22nd but campus did not fully re-open for the rest of the spring semester. Reviewing the Daily Illini, the concerns about Covid-19 before break were primarily about traveling abroad. In March 2020, the Daily Illini was still a physical newspaper and with the closing of campus, its publication was halted from March 15th through June 2020.
I was working at the Undergraduate Library in March 2020 and took the spring break week off on vacation. I never could have guessed that the libraries would close, and work and classes would move online for the rest of the semester. I remember even stating that there is no way the libraries would close, because at the time, they were considered an essential unit and were very rarely closed. Continue reading “Snapshot in Time: Campus During Covid”