By Micaella Rodriguez Staff Writer
The holidays will look a little different due to COVID-19. During Halloween, some students felt torn between going to parties with friends, going trick-or-treating, or just staying home under the direction of their parents. The number of cases in Bexar county increased since Oct. 28, 2020 with 281 daily cases until the December 2, 2020 peak of 1,499 daily cases. Cases on campus have also been rising, with 4 reported cases the week after Halloween, 4 cases the following week, 7 cases the week before Thanksgiving, 8 cases after we returned from Thanksgiving, and 14 cases reported December 7-11, 2020.
Some students are choosing to stay home and reduce exposure. Freshman Enrique Chapa chose to stay at home with his family for Halloween. Chapa mentioned that he doesn’t have any high-risk family members.
“We just don’t want to get sick and like, prevent it,” Chapa said.
Compared to previous Halloween memories, he wished he could do his usual holiday tradition.
“Probably just going around my neighborhood and getting candy from my neighbors,” Chapa said.
Many people this year aren’t going to be able to celebrate their normal traditions such as trick-or-treating and going out with friends. Some people on the other hand such as freshmen Ellie Price and Lauren Loudermilk have decided to have a lesser gathering such as hanging out with close family or friends.
Price’s plans to go to a small dinner with her family and their close friends. She said she also wanted to slow the spread of the coronavirus. Her Halloween plans would be going to dinner with her family and her family’s close friends. Price said that her family decided to celebrate this way to limit the number of people they came into contact with. Price shared if the pandemic didn’t happen this year, she’d go to the annual corn maze and spend time with friends.
Loudermilk shared that her family was also going to spend the evening with her parents’ close friends as well. She said that the other family has young children and they were planning to do some simple games such as cornhole to entertain themselves at home. They chose to have a small gathering because she said since her mom works at a middle school, she knows how serious and high the numbers are at schools.