Katherine Kittler’s roommate in Prague woke her up at 3 a.m. to tell her the United States was restricting travel from Europe. 

Kittler, a junior film production major, was studying abroad in Syracuse University’s CET Prague/FAMU program when the U.S. on March 11 implemented a 30-day ban on travel from most European countries due to the coronavirus pandemic. The restrictions would take effect March 13 at midnight. 

“At 3 a.m. I was woken up and at 8 a.m. I was on a flight,” Kittler said. 

Kittler is one of hundreds of SU students whose semesters abroad were cut short amid the spread of the novel coronavirus. After the university suspended all study abroad and global partner programs, students told The Daily Orange they were left booking flights and feeling uncertain about finishing the semester at home.

The novel coronavirus causes COVID-19, a respiratory disease that has infected at least 390,000 and killed at least 17,000 worldwide. New York state reported 25,665 positive cases as of Tuesday, 60 of which are in Onondaga County.  

SU Abroad’s program in Florence, Italy was the first to be suspended, shutting down on Feb. 25. Emmet Raichle, a junior policy studies major, said the announcement came as a shock to him and others in the program, who received the news at a Q&A session that evening.

“People started breaking down in tears calling their parents. It was a surreal environment to be in,” Raichle said.

Raichle said some students felt frustrated, wondering why the university wasn’t waiting another week in case the virus blew over. Looking back now, he said the program couldn’t have ended at a better time. Nearly 7,000 people in Italy have died of COVID-19, the highest death toll globally. 

Neeve Prendergast, a junior dual majoring in public relations and policy studies, was studying abroad in Madrid when SU suspended its Florence program. She didn’t think the Madrid program would be next.

Students in Madrid received an email stating the program was suspended on March 9, around 2 a.m., Prendergast said. Students began booking flights for that Sunday, the latest date they were given to leave, so they’d have as much time to spend in the country as possible. 

But when President Donald Trump announced two days later that the U.S. would temporarily restrict most travel from Europe, students began to panic. 

“It was pure chaos,” Prendergast said. 

Many students said the travel ban did not make clear at the time that U.S. citizens and permanent residents abroad in Europe would be allowed to reenter the country. Because of this confusion, students said they felt pressured to move their flights up as soon as possible.  

“It was confusing, to be honest, because they were making it sound really intense (like) we had to leave as soon as we possibly could,” Kittler said. 

Nicole Sklitsis, a junior dual major in writing, rhetoric and composition and public relations, left London on March 12, the same day SU suspended its abroad program in the city. She felt safe in the U.K. at the time, she said. The situation there seemed better than it was in her hometown of Westchester, New York, she said. The county has 3,891 confirmed cases as of Tuesday.

“When it hit London, there didn’t seem to be much of a change,” said Liran Federmann, a junior communications design major who also studied abroad in London. “To me it still seemed like people were acting like very little had happened.” 

Several students said they didn’t know what to expect when they arrived home. Kittler said she’d heard about food supplies running low and people raiding grocery stores for toilet paper. Federmann said he heard from family and friends that his neighborhood had become a ghost town. 

“All we’d heard coming from the states were these mixed stories and rumors about things that were happening,” said Katie Napell, a junior communications and rhetorical studies major who studied abroad in London. “I had no idea what I was going home to.”

The students all said they were shocked at how easily they were allowed back into the U.S., without any additional screenings, questions or temperature checks. Students who returned from studying abroad were quarantined in their homes for two weeks in accordance with guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 

Once they were finally home, former study abroad students grappled with the uncertainty of their semester going forward. 

Prendergast said she’s concerned about financial reimbursements. Sklitsis said her flight home was expensive because she booked it last minute. She emailed her receipts to SU and is hoping for a timely reimbursement, she said. 

Students, faculty and staff can request refunds for university-related travel suspended amid the coronavirus pandemic, university officials said in an SU News release. The university’s policy reimburses canceled trips and events if appropriate receipts are submitted.

Sklitsis also said she has no idea how her London history course, which revolved entirely around a three-hour walking tour, is going to move online.

“There were no textbooks, no readings. It was just walking and listening to our professor,” she said. “This class is not going to be able to be done remote.”

Sklitsis isn’t the only student concerned about the transition to online learning, particularly for excursion-based courses. Two of Napell’s classes also involved walking tours of London, she said. One course, which counted toward her major requirement, studied fashion in London, which she could never take on Main Campus, she said. 

Although the students are sad to think about the plans they made abroad that never came to fruition, they said they understand the public health concerns the virus poses.

“Studying abroad was great and it was sad that it got cut short, but there are people whose businesses and livelihood are being affected by this virus,” Kittler said. “It’s awful to see.”  

Raichle said his host family in Florence didn’t understand why SU had decided to suspend the program before he left. Now, he said he’s worried about his host parents, who are in their 70s, a demographic particularly susceptible to the virus. 

Several students said their experiences this semester have not discouraged them from traveling in the future. 

“I think that this (pandemic) is a once-in-a-lifetime kind of thing,” Napell said. “We just had really bad timing.”

Students who left their countries quickly said they regretted not being able to say goodbye to the friends they made and the people they met while abroad. The students all said they were grateful for the time they had abroad and the memories they made before returning home.

“(Studying abroad) is an experience that, no matter how long or short, you’ll remember for the rest of your life,” Napell said. 

Published on March 24, 2020 at 11:42 pm

Contact Sarah: scalessa@syr.edu | @sarahalessan