Reflections on Remote Learning: Harvard International Students

Three Harvard College freshmen from South Korea share their remote learning experiences.

The end of the 2020–2021 school year marks a new class of rising college sophomores, many of whom have never stepped foot onto their college campuses. Among them are international students, affected by changing immigration policies, visa restrictions, and university reopening plans.

On the same day that Harvard College released its fall plans for fully remote courses, the United States government announced that international students taking only online courses wouldn’t be allowed to stay in the country. Facing heavy backlash and a number of lawsuits, the administration rescinded the policy. But for newly admitted students who did not yet have visa status, the policy remained.

Many Universities accommodated first-year international students by offering hybrid or in-person courses. But despite Harvard’s invitation for freshmen to live on campus, their decision to hold all courses fully online meant that international students could not enter the country and join their peers.

To find out more about what it’s like to learn remotely, over 10,000 miles and 14 hours away from your peers, we spoke with three South Korean students who chose to start classes last fall.

Our Panelists:

What was your schedule like during the semester?

Jason:Classes are mostly synchronous, at least for first years, so I’m living a nocturnal life and I don’t sleep a lot. I was busier last semester because it was comping* season and I had a lot of Zoom meetings: weekly, at least 2 hours per organization, which was around 20 hours just for organizations, plus another 20 hours for classes at least.

*Comping: the process of joining an organization (often competitive, sometimes completion based)

Mincheol: I wake up and do a p-set (problem set), have a meal and then do a p-set, have a meal, do a p-set, and continue this cycle. I try to attend all live classes, so my sleeping schedule is a little bit messed up. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday I also go to the gym and over the weekend I try to go out to meet some friends.

Inseo:I didn’t want to stay up all night, so time was a big factor when I was choosing classes. My latest class ended at 2 in the morning, which isn’t too bad, but after daylight savings time ended that got pushed back by an hour. That was actually terrible because after classes end it’s not like I can sleep right away because my brain’s awake. My morning classes were much better than my late, late classes.

What were you most looking forward to about going to college? Has freshman year lived up to your expectations?

Inseo: I’m interested in theater, but I’ve never been able to take any classes related to theater or acting, so I was most excited for theater classes. I took this one acting class that was amazing. I had 3 professors who taught the class; they were all amazing. But I know that they could’ve been much better if it were offline.

Before the whole Corona situation, I was excited for the generic picture of US college: the large lecture room, various clubs, social meetings, etc., but I couldn’t be on campus to experience it because I’m an international student.

Jason: Pre-COVID, I was expecting a very fun first year. I was still applying to colleges and really looking forward to when I would finally get to go. After I got accepted (early December), COVID came, so we didn’t get to have prom or anything else. We had graduation in person, but it was still really limited, so I thought college life would be kind of the same thing.

College life, I would say, is a little bit worse than I expected. I live outside of Seoul, so I don’t get to meet a lot of friends, at least the ones in Korea, and I’m taking so many hard classes that I’m stuck at home and stressed out about classes.

Content-wise, I think I’m learning enough and there’s not much difference between going there or staying here. I’m learning more because I’m spending more time academically, but socially I’m losing out a lot.

Mincheol: Definitely lab experience. There are really great physicists at Harvard and whenever I talk to them, I think “wow this guy has a universe in his mind or in her mind,” so I wanted to be able to talk to the professors in person. Online settings and in person settings are very different in terms of those kinds of conversations. In-person I think I could have more of a conversation with professors and that would be really helpful for me to learn some of their viewpoints regarding nature and how they understand certain concepts. I still look forward to that for next semester.

In terms of expectations, I think it’s better than I expected. I have a lot of friends who went to SNU or KAIST, but I’ve heard a lot of complaints about their courses and I was very worried about my first year experience because I am studying abroad. Professors have been very kind and they are really good at interacting with the students and really care a lot about our learning and overall experiences.

What’s been the best part of your experience so far?

Mincheol: Professors are very non-authoritative. Whenever they are speaking we can interrupt if we have a question and they frequently ask us whether we have questions or any confusion.

My classmates ask really deep questions, so I learn from the questions themselves and the answers from the professor at the same time. I hope some people learn from my questions as well, and I think it’s a really great atmosphere.

Jason: I like the content of the classes, especially since I’m learning more deeply than in high school and I get to concentrate on my interests and choose my courses. I also learn a lot from my peers as I interact with them, which is really fun. It really feels like college, like debating and bouncing ideas off of each other and all that. Those are really valuable experiences, but they would be more valuable if it was in person.

Inseo: I lived alone and had a lot of time for myself to reflect on different things. I would like to think that I learned a lot about myself and about relationships and other existential things. I took a philosophy class so what can you expect? I guess in terms of having my time and my space, those were the silver linings of this pandemic.

Do you think there’s anything that had a particularly positive impact on your experience?

Jason: Asynchronous really helps a lot. It’s nice if classes allow asynchronous watching of the lectures, but a lot of classes are actually converting from traditional lectures because those are no different from Coursera courses. They’re trying to make it as interactive as possible, but sadly that also means there cannot be asynchronous classes.

Is there anything you wish Harvard had done better? Were there any broken promises Harvard made but didn’t follow through with?

Mincheol: Schools like Columbia prepared a workspace in Seoul where people affiliated to the university could work together and socialize. I think that’s something that Harvard might have done better if they wanted to.

In terms of broken promises, I think the incredible thing about Harvard is that they don’t make any promises they can’t keep, but the problem is that they don’t make any promises until everything is clear. They’re very conservative about making policies and usually wait until two weeks after every other school has released theirs. I guess it’s good in some ways because a lot of schools rescinded their policies regarding in-person instruction in the spring, but Harvard only announced that there would be no in-person instruction and we had no false hope.

Inseo: I understand why Harvard is not allowing international students on their campus when so many other top schools are doing so, but it almost feels like they’re dodging the problem. From the very beginning, they tried to tell us that it wouldn’t be very different. They tried very hard to persuade us, but by saying that, they’re saying “we’re not actually gonna do anything to make you feel connected.” I wouldn’t say they didn’t try, but I feel like other US colleges did more for international students.

How was your experience socially?

Jason:I think I’m much closer to my Korean friends, probably because I’ve physically met them and just hung out with them. I’ve actually spent much more time with my friends from classes because of p-set groups and having to work together. I interact with them, at least hours-wise, much longer, but I don’t think I’m as close to them as my Korean friends, probably because of meeting offline and online.

Mincheol: I think I chose my courses very well this year. I took very challenging math and physics courses where we are given a lot of difficult problems and we have to solve them together, so I’ve met a lot of good friends that way. I’m also serving as a Course Assistant for quantum mechanics right now and I think that experience is also very helpful for meeting new people in physics and holding office hours is really enjoyable as well.

Inseo: I don’t really like making friends online or through Zoom. I want to meet them in person, so it was really hard for me to make friends and meet people. I was lucky to meet gap year people who are living in Korea and the other students in Korea, but that was all.

Is there anything from your online experience that you hope will continue when you shift to in-person learning?

Jason: I would like lectures to still be recorded because we get to go back and re-watch them, which is really helpful, and we don’t have to really take notes. Also, this is just my guess, but, because we are online, I think they are giving out more resources and updating their websites much faster so we get to utilize those things more than if we were in person.

How has your experience been with technology?

Mincheol: I think technology-wise my only issue is with WIFI.

I also use Slack a lot. I’m nearly the only person asking questions on Slack. The problem of asking questions in Slack is sometimes I ask very silly questions and then they’re recorded on Slack with my name and everyone in the class can see. It’s embarrassing, but I still think it’s a really good learning experience.

Inseo: I don’t think I’m a very digital person. I don’t really use my computer a lot except when I’m writing essays and stuff, so the whole zoom situation was frustrating for me. I’m a very analogue person, so it was challenging for me because everything had to be through zoom or the computer.

Anything else you would like to share?

Inseo: I’m not here to persuade anyone, but I would say, from my perspective, if the pandemic continues and international students aren’t allowed on campus next semester, I would advise people to take leave of absence or gap year before enrolling because it’s just not ideal. You only get 4 years of college and I don’t think you would want to spend one fourth of it in your home.

Responses has been edited for length and clarity.

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