By Sam Goodykoontz

In a scary and uncertain year because of the Covid-19 pandemic, alumna Tykiera Jordan was still able to take in-person college classes at the University of Notre Dame.

Tykiera, part of the Class of 2020, currently studies engineering at the school. Yikes. Sounds difficult, right? A difficult major at a tough university during a global pandemic; that takes a lot of effort. Well, Tykeria has given it her all, and the campus has been proficient at precautions.

She even took on two types of engineering for her major. “Through my time of discernment I was juggling between two majors: chemical and/or mechanical engineering, but I ended up picking chemical,” she said. “This semester I have now switched over to mechanical.”

She chose chemical first: “Based on the career that I want to go into, which is biomedical engineering, it initially made sense to me that going in as a chemical engineer made the most sense.”

Let it be known that what you are expecting your college major to be like may not at all be what it’s really like. The classes for your major may focus on something entirely different than what you thought.

For Tykeria, it was sort of what she expected, though not entirely. “I knew what I was going into, but the material was way harder than expected,” she said. In order to work through the stress, she “maintained a healthy balance between my social life and work life. Once I got used to my schedule, it became easier and I was able to make a system that worked for me.”

Not only did Tykeria have to work through the stress of Notre Dame’s rigorous work, she also had to work through the stress of Covid-19. Indiana, where Notre Dame is located, has not had as many new cases as Arizona, but new cases still reached to the thousands.

According to Tykeria, “each week every student has to do a mandatory Covid-19 test. Each class has the option of either going in person to class or attending on Zoom. Each class has a limited number of students and each seat is distanced from each other.

“On-campus activities have been limited as well. I feel pretty safe with these precautions. They are doing as much as they can in a situation that they have never been put in before all to make our learning experience the best it can be. As long as the students do their part, the campus can be as Covid-safe as possible.”