UNC Asheville student finishes semester at home in Greensboro
Oct 29, 2024
GREENSBORO, N.C. (WGHP) -- As western North Carolina recovers from Helene, there are strides to re-open at the University of North Carolina Asheville. Classes started back up online on Monday. On Wednesday, they start a phased approach to open back up the student residence halls.
But not everyone plans to go back immediately. Claire Gigley is a senior at UNCA and is back home this semester with her parents in Greensboro. They live extremely close to the University of North Carolina Greensboro campus. Claire says it is hard to watch all the students walk by every day to go to class, and she can’t do that yet.
“My theory of personality class, which is basically just personality psychology,” Gigley said. She is a psychology major with plans to be a therapist for kids. “I want to be a good person to talk to and to listen."
Her senior year is not going as planned.
“I am not going to go back for the rest of the semester because classes are going to be online for the rest of the semester,” Gigley said.
Instead of in classrooms and her dorm room, she is at her family’s kitchen table in Greensboro next to her dad.
“It is nice because I am not the only one working, and it is less lonely,” Gigley said.
This week, her dorm room will open back up, but she decided it was best to stay put.
“I thought I should just stay home ... There is water and internet … I already know if I go back, my mental health is going to plummet,” Gigley said.
She is back on her computer to finish college, the same way she finished high school during the pandemic.
“That was really hard for me,” Gigley said.
She has one semester left before graduation, and she hopes to get back to campus.
“Hopefully, I will be able to go back, and teachers will be able to go back, I don’t know how much damage every teacher experienced," Gigley said.
She left Asheville before things got too bad. Her stay in Greensboro has turned from days into months. She went back once to grab more from her dorm room.
“There was a lot of downed trees,” Ggley said.
The campus is cleaned up, but it will take a while for the rest of Asheville to recover.
“I just like how artsy and beautiful it is up there … It kind of makes me sad because it is not going to be the same there even when you go back, and things are better,” Gigley said.
There is a temporary water system in place at UNCA for students who do want to return this week. Gigley hopes to wait things out in Greensboro until the spring semester.