Author(s)

Cheryl Holden, Tesa Brown

Department of Masters in Healthcare Administration, University of Arkansas-Fort Smith, Fort Smith, AR, USA.

While there is ample research on how the COVID-19 pandemic impacted students, data does not sufficiently address how COVID-19 affected graduate-level students enrolled in an online platform. The study completed in December 2020 aimed to answer what coping strategies students in a full online graduate program utilized during the COVID-19 pandemic. The data collection tool consisted of a questionnaire distributed via anonymous survey using university email. It is common knowledge that graduate-level students are held to higher rigor and standards. The overall perception was that graduate students should not be impacted by the pandemic’s academic changes since the graduate program was entirely online pre-COVID-19. This perception proved to be untrue. The data analysis reflected mental health as the second largest area of impact for online graduate-level students due to the pandemic. In this study, graduate-level students shared coping strategies that worked well for them throughout the pandemic. This data will help fill a gap in research and hopefully spark the interest of graduate programs to offer coping strategies to promote mental health among their graduate-level students regardless of whether they are participating in traditional or online learning platforms.

COVID-19, Graduate Students, Coping Strategies, Well-Being, Mental Health

Holden, C. and Brown, T. (2021) Students in Graduate Program Share Coping Strategies Utilized during the COVID-19 Pandemic. Open Journal of Social Sciences, 9, 15-21. doi: 10.4236/jss.2021.97002.