In trying to answer my essential question, “How can communities stay engaged during a global pandemic?,” I am constantly reminded of why this topic is important to me. Along with many others, I am currently socially isolated with only my immediate family because of the pandemic; the communities I otherwise rely on and spend much of my time within are not accessible in the same way. I am exploring this question because I want to actively learn and try to create more engagement with these communities in a time when I believe it’s needed most.

While I don’t have experience living through a pandemic, I have been a member of online communities. I am an editor for jGirls magazine, an online platform for female Jewish voices, and we have always done meetings and work together virtually because the editors and submitters come from all over the country and world. Developing relationships with my co-editors and creating an online community of writers/artists online through jGirls has helped me transition to similar interactions within my other groups (my track team, synagogue teen group, camp community, and others). Since the Coronavirus began moving people online, the creator of jGirls, Elizabeth Mandel, created a resource laying out advice about how to make online communities/teaching successful. I read her piece last week, in which she emphasized the importance of using students as resources, embracing flexibility, and incorporating socializing-time into meetings. 

Resources such as the one above are helpful, but I want to answer my essential question through experience as well. I have many questions specific to my community, and more broad, that I will continue to explore. How have my communities’ purposes changed? How does the shift to virtual interactions affect our ability to check in on one another or notice when people are being excluded? In a time of social isolation, is it necessary to open up our communities, become tighter, or keep as much normalcy as possible?