This past fall semester was one like none other. With Covid still on a rampage, manypeople have questions about what the spring semester of 2021 is going to look like at Northern Essex Community College.

It has previously been stated that classes are still going be 100% remote, but they’regoing to encourage professors to schedule mandatory zoom meetings with their students in orderto add structure to their classes.

The main issue with having mandatory class meeting times is that a lot of students are choosing to work because of the pandemic, or have different work schedules than they normally would. Also, students would normally choose their classes based on what times are available to them, but that was not how the spring of 2021 classes were chosen.

This means that most students are going to have different schedules than each other, and not all of them are going to be able to attend these meetings. Also, professors could all end up holding meetings at the same time for the same students, unlike high school where everything is blocked out.

Lastly, many students that are going to be getting their degree in the spring are wondering whether or not there will be a graduation ceremony.

Some staff members have said that they really enjoy the ceremony and I hope that there will be one in 2021, but again, it all depends on the advances with COVID-19. As of now, graduation in spring of 2021 is supposed to be on May 15. At this time there is no concrete knowledge of whether or not the 59th annual commencement of NECC Will happen, but the students and staff all hope for it to.