Christmas break was tough for VTSU-Castleton freshman Malorie Tarbell. Don’t get her wrong, she likes breaks, but she hates being away from her college friends.   

“I sat around mostly, but I also couched,” She said. “I was happy to come back, it just mostly is a lot of work.” Tarbell is the assistant coach for Mill River Union High School track and cross country team while going to school.   

She talked about “being alone a lot” and how that wasn’t much fun. And she’s not alone. Several other students talked about how the break wasn’t great for them…..  

A transfer student Samantha Brayton found it hard to leave all her friends back at Johnson. Over break, she was able to go back and spend a lot of time with them, which was great.   

One of her biggest issues over break was getting COVID-19.   

“We had a whole Christmas planned out, and then everyone besides me, my mom, and my dad, got COVID. We had to cancel everything, and then my brother was stranded in Nebraska with covid” she said. Brayton was also able to do a lot of her hobbies over break. “I went on a bunch of hikes, I cooked a bunch of food. I made some bread, some pretzels, I cooked all of my Christmas dinner,” she said.   

While some students did not have a great break, others did, but it wasn’t always all roses for them either.   

Daniel Lee Wright iii, an early college student, says he had a pretty good break. It wasn’t all fun though. Wright III had to go to California.  

“My great-grandma is dying, so my dad wanted to go see her. I saw a lot of my family through my dad’s side” he said. He was happy to be able to see family, he had not been able to see in a while.   

Even though he did have that going on he was able to make his break fun. He liked to break a lot as he got to “hang out with my best friend”. As his friend will be leaving soon, it was good that they were able to spend all that time together.   

Samantha Bailey was another student who had a great break, but not without something unpleasant happening. Bailey unfortunately did stab her tendon in her thumb which ended up with having to get hand surgery. This ended up making break a little challenging, but she liked being able to stay home over break. Bailey liked that she was able to spend more time at home and hang out with her boyfriend.   

Coming back to school from break was hard for most students, as most students found it boring.  

Bailey is one of them. Coming back to school one-handed was hard enough, she also was “tired, school is kind of draining, school is like the same day over and over, so I was not looking forward to it. But I was excited about my new classes,” she said.   

Liana Wu also found that coming back to school was hard. “It was horrible because over summer break I had such a productive break. And then when I got to school I was ready to get to work. Then this break it was so boring and when I got back to school I wanted to continue my break.”   

Wu found it easier for herself to be more productive in school when she was able to be productive over break. But this break there just was not much to do.   

Brayton being a transfer student was excited, but also nervous to be starting a new semester at a new place. Another hard thing was starting at a new school, and not being with her friends. But she is loving it on this campus and has found a lot of new friends. But she is struggling with that “There is no hot water or heat in my dorm”  

More than Brayton are loving being back on campus, and it is going well for them.   

Wright III an early college student, says that this semester is going very smoothly for him. Getting his schedule together for the semester was easygoing.   

Tarbel is also excited to be back, able to hang out with all of her friends that she had missed.  

Unfortunately, she does not have as much time to work on her drawing and latch hooking as she did over break. But she is glad to be back and be around so many loving people.