FOR those of us in education, summer is usually a time to rest, reflect and prepare for the upcoming year.
The academic timetable is comfortingly predictable, and mid-September brings energy and excitement about the year ahead.
But this has been a year like no other. As Northern Ireland's national student president I have spent the summer searching for answers to questions we have never had to ask before. What will classes
really look like? Is it safe for students to come back to campus? What about disabled and immuno-compromised students? How will students develop a support network if they spend most of their week on a laptop in their bedroom?
Let me make it very clear: the student movement strongly supports all public health efforts to keep people safe. Everyone should be working together as a community to socially distance, wear masks and get tested when we need to.
Students have been instructed to return to campus, leaving their families and support networks to move into busy, multi-occupancy houses and halls. Thousands of these students still did not know whether their courses would be in person or online when they had to sign their house contract for the year ahead.
With `freshers' events and clubs and societies moved online for the most part, it will be harder than ever for students to form vital social support networks. I'm particularly worried about first year students living away from home for the first time. This can be tough in usual circumstances, but to do so in the middle of a pandemic, with restrictions on socialising and the chance of long spells of isolation, poses a real risk to their mental and physical health.
I've already heard those in government point to house parties and street drinking as the main culprits of a rise in cases. I share their concerns and am afraid that our campuses may become unsafe for students before classes even begin.
But where is the guidance and consistent messaging speaking to students? I am angry that these individual cases are being used as a distraction from the government's lack of political leadership around an issue which we knew was coming, and we knew needed significant intervention.
Northern Ireland is the only part of the UK or Ireland which did not release guidance about the return to higher education campuses.
When restrictions were announced for the Belfast area just one week before freshers began, there was no mention by the government of what this would mean for the incoming student populations. I have written to both the health and economy ministers seeking answers for students on whether it is still safe for them to move into new housing and permissible to travel home at the weekends for work. I have yet to receive a reply.
It seems that by distancing themselves from the problem the government hoped that it would go away on its own.
Isolating students as a problem group is reckless, counterproductive, and will not build the trust we need to beat this virus together. There are thousands of students you don't see in the news - ones who are following every guideline, who continue to work on the frontline of the NHS, who have been supporting their communities and families throughout the pandemic.
They have also been failed by lack of government leadership and face an uncertain and potentially isolating year ahead.
When we had the A-level fiasco just weeks ago, we all got behind young people to make sure that they could go to university. Now let's stay behind them in making sure they can study safely.
:: Ellen Fearon is president of the NUS-USI student body.
