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HUMANS OF QUARANTINE The Corona virus resulted in the closure of our beloved faculty. BK City turned silent, students and employees left and the continuous buzz in the model workshop faded away. Graduation students are probably suffering the most. They expected their last year to be completely different. The women below are somewhat lucky though, living in the same student house while working diligently on their graduation projects. What is it like to graduate in quarantine?
Kyra van den Berg - Msc graduation student, Track: Management in the Built Environment (MBE) The timing of this 1.5 meter society we live in matched rather well with my graduation project. Just before the national measures, on the 12th of March, I finished the data collection for my research and conducted a final discussion group with residents. Just in time, lucky me! Although Corona barely impacts my graduation from the practical perspective, emotionally it definitely does. Normally, I am switching my work environment a lot; some days in the library, some days at the faculty and some days at the office. Social activities take a huge hit as well. Since the outbreak of Corona I am obliged to work at home and life looks totally different. Every day feels the same and there are less opportunities to share my thoughts with others. Where I normally bump into fellow students or colleagues at the coffee machine, I am now in my room all the time and graduation really has become a solo project. That said, I live in a student house, which makes this period way more fun! Following the ideology “If we cannot go to the outside world, we bring the outside world in here!”, we created a barbershop, Zumba classes, an outdoor gym (including fanatic instructors), a library and even a print shop. Together we make the best of it and give mental support when needed. Taken all things together, I would say corona “messed-up” the graduation process a bit, but at least it is a graduation process to remember. It is a dualistic, positive, negative, moving, non-moving, socially, solo time, which is special in many ways.//
Marloes Bier – MSc graduation student, Track: Architecture In September I started my graduation in the chair of Heritage&Architecture. I am making a design for a library in a 19th century Neogothical church. The first part of my graduation I always worked at BK City, together with other people from my graduation studio. The 13th of March we were sent away from the faculty. Because of Corona we couldn’t work there anymore. For me that was quite a shock, but I took all my stuff with me and started working from home. At first this wasn’t nice. I was used to be able to chat and discuss about my design, but now I had to decide all things on my own. After a month, two of the girls of my studio and me started working together on Skype. Every weekday we meet at 9 in the morning, chat for a bit and then we put ourselves on mute. The whole day we are on Skype, so when someone has a question, she can just ask right away. This “online atelier” really helps me through my graduation and it is also very fun at times! Also my house has never been as important for me as it is now. I live with fourteen and we do a lot together nowadays. Two of my roommates are also in their graduation and we help each other through the tough moments. Coincidentally our graduation schemes are quite similar, if everting works out fine we will have our graduation presentations within two weeks of each other. I’ve just passed my P4. For years I’ve wanted to make an epic final model for my graduation, so I am now transforming the spare room in my student house into a mini model workshop. With the help of some of my roommates I am sure the model is going to be awesome!//
