When Chattanooga-area schools cleared their buildings in mid-March in an effort to keep the coronavirus from spreading in Hamilton County, the move felt something like a fire drill: Grab what you need and get out. For most students, that meant a laptop for virtual learning at home over the next two weeks.
But the all-clear never came for a return to the classroom. Two weeks turned into a month, and eventually in-person instruction was canceled for the rest of the academic year. Even with a new school year underway, home will be the classroom for the majority of the week.
Many office workers have also shifted to similar work-from-home arrangements, taking computer setups but often little else to accomplish the tasks of a workweek away from the office.
As important as those digital lifelines have been to students and office workers alike, they couldn’t overcome some of the impediments to remote work and distance learning exposed by all that time at home. Chief among them: the importance of proper furnishings.
Spend enough time away from school or the office and you learn that not all chairs are created equal. The kitchen table may be fine for a couple of hours of schoolwork or to set up for a Zoom call, but spend several hours there, day after day, week after week, and you may come to loathe a ladderback.