95: Lauren Degezelle

Preschool Teacher, Berkshire Heights

Lauren DeGezelle is a preschool teacher at Berkshire Heights Early Learning Center. She worked at a different preschool when the pandemic began, but it was closed down due to COVID concerns and Lauren was without work for a few months. She works 40 hours a week, teaching her preschool class, assembling lesson plans, and working on social skills with the children. When her school closed during the first March of the pandemic, Lauren stopped getting paid; however, she felt like she owed it to her kids to help them prepare for kindergarten, so she put together weekly virtual lessons and activities for them. She also worked at a day camp over that summer. A huge concern she had when she began in person school again was how the children would react to having to wear masks all of the time, but they surprised her with how dutiful and compliant they were. They obviously wanted to see their classmates’ faces, but they knew it was what they needed to do.  

Lauren lives with her husband who also worked throughout the pandemic. They did struggle financially for the time that she was out of work, but they were able to pull through and Lauren was able to take that time to focus on her health. She definitely takes more time for herself now and learned to slow down a bit. She also makes an even more concerted effort to stay very connected to her family, having needed to be apart from them for an extended time. Something that gives Lauren hope is that she saw so many people going above and beyond for others during the pandemic, on social media and in public. Despite the risks, people were making an effort to help others in public, even something as small as just holding a door. It was clear to her that people began to see things differently and reprioritize. In the future, she hopes that we can have more appreciation for people who are so critical to the structure of our society, but often go overlooked, like teachers, grocery store employees, cleaners, and other essential but underappreciated workers.