An exploration into the history of the 1918 Influenza Pandemic and the societal impacts associated with it, as well as an analysis of the developing SARS-CoV-2 pandemic today. Based upon these analyses, similarities were drawn between the two pandemics which suggested a lack of innovation in preventative measures over the last century. Given this conclusion a series of proposals were made that should be further explored to give not only the United States, but the world at large, a better chance in the face of the next emerging disease.

Spring of 2020 and the COVID-19 pandemic brought significant challenges and life changes for people around the world. The sudden isolation, the health-related anxiety, and the drastic changes in daily routines affected everyone. This study measures the impact COVID-19 had on incoming first-year students at Arizona State University, and how the pandemic impacted their mental health. A total of 92 students participated in this study and were recruited through convenience sampling. In order to gain a better understanding of how students were truly doing transitioning into college during the pandemic, both quantitative and qualitative data were collected in the forms of a survey and optional follow-up interviews. Congruent with previous literature, the survey found that the COVID-19 pandemic had a negative impact on college students and their mental health. Seven students completed the follow-up interviews and expanded on their answers in the survey through personal examples of their first-year experiences. After the survey and follow-up interviews were completed, I presented my findings for first-year students in Mary Lou Fulton Teacher’s College to help students see that they were not alone. This research allowed students the opportunity to be heard and share their experiences, as well as, to obtain access to resources that promote their mental health and academic success during the challenging time.

This scoping review provides a synthesis of research which maps the literature on the topic of COVID-19 related impact on Undergraduate Student Mental Health and Baccalaureate Success. The purpose of this review was to identify existing literature pertaining to the psychological repercussions of COVID-19 on the undergraduate population, describe the range of successful interventions used to reduce stress and demand on the U.S. undergraduate population during a pandemic, and identify implications for future research. Due to the novelty of coronavirus and limited research on the given topic, this review provides a framework of available research by identifying types of available research, identifying how research is conducted on the topic, identifying and analyzing knowledge gaps, and clarifies key concepts in literature.

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a tremendous impact on people’s lives and it has reemphasized health inequities in the United States. Historically, minority communities have faced barriers to accessing health care and demonstrated hesitancies to getting vaccinated for various diseases. This has led to disparities in terms of how different diseases affect different communities. This same pattern has been seen regarding how COVID-19 has affected different ethnicities in the U.S. Statistics have shown vaccination disparities for COVID-19 among different ethnicities and organizations in the U.S. have employed different strategies to address this health inequity. This thesis analyzes the hesitancies and barriers to getting vaccinated for COVID-19, specifically among African Americans and Hispanics. Additionally, this thesis looks at the strategies that have been used to address the vaccination inequities that have affected these two ethnicities with a focus specifically on how mass vaccination sites and mobile health clinics try to address the vaccination disparity.

Our thesis project is a 5-person group thesis that was created over the span of two years. In the summer of 2020, at the height of the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, our group first met and discussed our shared interests in mask-wearing and individual factors that we each thought had significant impacts on mask-wearing among Barrett students. We each decided on factors that we wanted to investigate and subsequently split into three main groups based on our interests: culture and geography, medical humanities, and medical and psychological conditions. Despite these different interests, we continued to treat our thesis as a five-person project rather than three different projects. We then constructed a survey, followed by several focus group sessions and interview questions to ask Honors students. In January 2021, we received approval from the IRB for our project, and we quickly finalized our survey, focus group and interview questions. In February 2021, we sent out our survey via the Barrett Digest, which we kept open for approximately one month. We also sent out advertisements for our survey via social media platforms such as Twitter and Discord. Following completion of the survey, we contacted all of the respondents who stated that they were interested in participating in focus groups and interviews. Focus groups and interviews were conducted in March and April 2021, and results were analyzed and correlated to our individual subtopics. Each of the focus group and interview participants received $50 each, and three randomly-selected students who completed the survey received $25 each. From April 2021 until April 2022, we analyzed our results, came to conclusions based on our initial topics of interest, and constructed our paper.