Virus response trails student from China
A student on a four-year scholarship to study in China is temporarily back in Palmerston North, learning remotely while in lockdown.
Former St Peter’s College head girl Krista Mcjarrow-keller is two years into the $300,000 scholarship awarded by friendshipcity Kunshan to study at the Duke Kunshan University.
But in mid-january, during Chinese New Year, the Covid-19 wave was coming.
‘‘At that time there were under 10 cases in the city closest to us and none in the city that I live in, but the university took very careful precautions.’’
The school went into quarantine and students were told to make arrangements to return to their home countries.
The university helped cover the costs of flights, which Mcjarrow-keller said were expensive to come by at the last minute.
She arrived home at the end of January and within weeks New Zealand was heading toward its own lockdown against the virus.
Initially, the university semester was suspended for three weeks.
Duke Kunshan staff who were able to travel flew to Duke University in the United States to prepare for online teaching, and study resumed through New Zealand’s Covid-19 alert levels.
Mcjarrow-keller is looking to be back in Kunshan in August for the start of the new academic year.
She said the pandemic had affected other students’ plans more than her own.
Students were, in normal times, encouraged to take internships in China or abroad during the Northern Hemisphere summer. That was not happening this year.
Third year students usually spent a semester studying at Duke University in North Carolina. ‘‘So those that were going to go in the fall semester, which would be August this year, may have to change their plans as well, depending on how the USA fares.’’
Mcjarrow-keller was hoping it would be safe for her to take up the study option in the US in January next year.