May 19, 2020
The global COVID-19 pandemic transformed what would have been just another spring quarter to the historic Spring Quarantine Quarter of 2020. With great effort and speed, the university's in-person operation was modified to a community of remote learners, teachers and workers, with almost every university function, duty and responsibility adapted to be performed virtually in order to mind social distancing guidelines.
But not every staff member can join a Zoom meeting, jump on a conference call or sit in front of a laptop to do their job. While most are working, teaching or learning from home, the university's on-campus workers, our DePaul heroes, continue to head into the office to manage current campus operations and prepare for when we can return to Lincoln Park and the Loop.
From a safe distance, Newsline caught up with some of our on-campus staff members on April 21, before the Illinois mask order went into effect, to see how the COVID-19 crisis has changed life on the university grounds and to learn “in their own words" what it's been like for them during this unprecedented time in DePaul's history.
"This is part of history, and I'm doing the task that we're supposed to be doing out here on the front lines, and I'm doing the best I can," Wally Rabenda, custodian.
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(Photo made April 21, 2020, by Jeff Carrion, University Photographer, Marketing and Communications)
This is a part of history, and I'm doing what we need to do out here on the front lines. We're all doing the best we can. This is a virus nobody knew about, and I'm making it safer for our students, their families, our faculty and staff. I'm disinfecting and making the environment safe for all of us.
Where everything is being touched, I'm constantly cleaning so hopefully no one catches anything. The university has been great about giving us the supplies we need to attack this virus and get the task done.
After 27 years here of coming and seeing students and faculty, I now feel like I'm in a movie. In our lifetime we just saw what a virus can do to a whole country. The university is doing a great job to inform students, faculty and staff. I'm positive the university is going to come back strong.