The Knox College community is a global one, reaching far and wide. In these times, everyone is doing their part to control the spread of COVID-19 by staying home, working remotely or in-person at essential businesses, working on the front lines as healthcare professionals, and so on. 

Because of this, Knox has created the COVID-19 Stories blog. It spotlights people's stories and aims to help shrink the distance between members of the Knox community by affirming care and support for one another in this difficult time.

The Knox College COVID-19 Stories blog is organized into different sections such as Community, Coping, Healthcare, Education, and Family. These sections are full of recent personal stories, learning moments, advice, and inspiration from Knox alumni, faculty and staff, friends, and more.

Members of the Knox community are encouraged to read these stories of persistence and inspiration and to send in their own. Together, these blog posts from a living journal of the Knox community that tells a story of strength.

The blog features the stories of Knox alumni in the healthcare industry like Adam Nader '07, a cardiologist in Miami, Florida; Mary Stoffel '82, an OB/Gyn in a woman-owned independent private practice in Madison, Wisconsin; and Sam Jarvis '09, who works as a community health manager in Iowa City, Iowa.

BJ Hollars '07 writes in a post about his “Hope is the Thing” project—created in late March with the writers guild of Chippewa Valley, Wisconsin—that chronicles experiences of hope through creative writing throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.

There’s also the story of Steve Suskin '72, director of development for the Afya Foundation in New York, a company whose “mission has pivoted from international medical relief to providing desperately needed medical supplies to hospitals, federally qualified health centers, and organizations which serve the elderly.” 

Among these posts is a plethora of advice about adapting to life at home, such as tips for living in lockdown, information about home-schooling children from Knox faculty members Eric Dickens, assistant professor of educational studies, and Joel Estes, visiting instructor and chair of educational studies, and a window into the experience of educating from home in a joint interview with alumnae Paige McDaniel ’18 and Hannah Bloyd-Peshkin Tatro ’14, teachers who are educating their students online.

Needless to say, turning to one another in times of need is part of the Knox community's DNA. This blog is a communal space for all of Knox. Please read these stories, comment on them, and contribute new ones.

Photo at the top of the page is a composite, with the upper row representing BJ Hollars' project, followed by images of Hannah Bloyd-Peshkin Tatro and Sam Jarvis; and the bottom row showing images of Paige McDaniel, Mary Stoffel, Eric Dickens.