2020 has been a struggle for everyone. This year has had lots of ups and downs, but mostly downs. In the United States there have been over 340,000 deaths from COVID-19 alone, lots of countries around the world all had their shutdowns to try and prevent COVID-19, social justice issues being brought to the surface and finally being talked about.

Winter

In January everyone thought this would just be another year and was not expecting the year we had. The first thing that kicked off this year was Kobe Bryant on January 26, a famous basketball player and his daughter, along with seven others, were killed in a tragic helicopter accident. This left so many people sad and devastated. Around the end of February, COVID-19 cases started to skyrocket and that is when the United States decided that we need to go into a nationwide lockdown. Senior Caleb Belting says, “During this time I couldn’t do much which was stressful so I just caught up on shows and played lacrosse.” Many people lost so much during this time, including their jobs, homes and so much more. This virus has affected and taken so many lives. To this day it is still going on, shutting schools and businesses down once again. Math teacher Ms. Kristen Andrix said, “This has been a year of raw emotions. I’ve appreciated more family time while struggling with the demands of teaching and connecting with students in ways I’ve never been trained.”

Spring

While students and families were following the Stay at Home order, a man named George Floyd was killed on May 25 which left the whole world in utter disbelief. After peacefully protesting about it for many days and not being heard, the Minneapolis riots started. These riots caused lots of attention and lots of people got hurt. Many businesses were burned down and broken into because of this. This situation brought a lot of attention to the Black Lives Matter movement and the death of Floyd really pushed this movement to a bigger stage.

Summer

During June and July wildfires in Colorado had started and become bigger than expected. In the article, California exceeds 4 million acres burned by wildfires in 2020 it talks about how many acres and how much land the fires affected. The fires left so many families homeless and had many evacuated, having to leave the state. Australia also had many fires that were similar to Colorados, in this article Almost 3 billion animals affected by Australian bushfires, reports show over three billion animals died due to the fires. After summer, things started to look up just a little bit, most people were going back to work and kids were going back to school.

Fall

But after a while, in October, COVID-19 cases started to climb, forcing more nationwide shutdowns and heavy restrictions. On Nov. 3, 2020, the Presidential Election between Donald Trump and Joe Biden was held. The results brought controversy politically between both parties and when the results came back Biden had won. After the results were announced many rumors went around about voter fraud from the democrat party. On Jan. 6 the Congress will meet and potentially confirm the Electoral College votes.

December 11 some big, good news had finally been shared about a vaccine that was made for COVID-19. The first people that were able to get the vaccine were health care workers and the military. After all the first people were able to get it the states with the biggest population were given it and the governors then decided how to give it out after that. Anyone who is more likely to get it was more encouraging to get it. By the end of January 2021, it is projected at least 50 million people will be vaccinated.

At the beginning of the year, we all thought it would be a good one, but looking back everyone can agree that it wasn’t at all. Senior Kaylei Karow says, “ 2020 was nothing like I wanted it to be.” Overall 2020 has become a very historical year. So much happened in the matter of a year that some have never seen in a lifetime. We’ve all learned a lot this year, lots of patience, how to get through some of our toughest times and the biggest thing is motivation.

Writer Note: This story was written before the events happening on Jan. 6, 2021.