Last week the University hosted Moms Weekend during a pandemic. The activities this year looked very different because of COVID-19, with the in-person activities being replaced with virtual events.
“Typically we have on-campus activities for Moms Weekend, but we had a number of virtual events this weekend instead,” said Mayura Kumar, vice president of External Communication for the Moms Association.
According to Illini Moms Association, some of the virtual events that were planned for Moms Weekend were Mother and Student Video, Illini Talk with Judy Hsu, Illini Virtual Scavenger Hunt and the University’s Moms Association Annual Meeting and Awards.
“When we started planning these (events) we wanted to make sure that we were planning events appealing to both students and moms,” Kumar said. “We wanted to make them as interactive as possible because everyone is already on Zoom all day long.”
Dylan Kanner, freshman in DGS, had his mom come over for Moms Weekend.
“I don’t really know what Moms Weekend would have been like (before the pandemic),” Kanner said. “The virtual event was on Zoom. It was as interactive as it could be (while remaining) virtual. They made break-out rooms around 5 (p.m.) and we worked together for the scavenger hunt. It was kind of fun.”
Furthermore, there were many students and moms going to the bars last weekend.
With the pandemic still not fully under control, there were concerns about the influx of visitors from other cities.
“Any time we see an influx of folks from out of the area come to the area, it is possible we would expect to see some disease transmission,” said Justine Kaplan, director of the Master of Public Health Program. “This happens regularly with things like the common cold, as well as with bigger issues like (COVID-19).”
Kaplan mentioned that the best steps in avoiding transmission with an influx of visitors would be wearing a mask, washing your hands, social distancing and getting the vaccine, if possible.

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