Born of chilling student social and physical isolation off campus; faculty and staff burnout from rebuilding classes in new delivery methods and modes; budget cuts, furloughs and layoffs; depressing learning gaps; stress and fear for health of self, family and friends, a mental health epidemic of epic proportions is rising out of the virus pandemic. It will unfold in the cold, dark months of winter — December, January, February and into March — when the death toll mounts higher and higher before a hoped-for spring of vaccinated immunity begins to bring hope and some measure of mobility and in-person engagement.

The ramifications of this epidemic on top of the pandemic are sure to be long-lasting and pervasive. We are already seeing the beginnings of the mental health epidemic. After so many months of 12-hour workdays and seven-day workweeks, the support staff members who have labored with little recognition to modify and enhance remote-learning modules into online classes are burning out. In a striking article in Educause Review, Patrice Prusko and Whitney Kilgore describe “Burned Out: Stories of Compassion Fatigue”:

To obtain additional perspectives on these challenges, during the summer we interviewed five individuals who work across various roles within instructional design, collecting their stories of burnout and compassion fatigue. (For this article, we have changed their names.) Their candid reports bear witness to the difficulties being faced by so many people during the pandemic, and their stories also speak to the work being done on the front lines of higher education in the midst of this crisis.

Too often we use the term “burnout” loosely. Yet it is a defined condition. “Burnout is characterized by emotional exhaustion, cynicism and ineffectiveness in the workplace, and by chronic negative responses to stressful workplace conditions. While not considered a mental illness, burnout can be considered a mental health issue,” according to Workplace Strategies for Mental Health.

Burnout is characterized by a wide array of symptoms that may include increased errors, fatigue, suspiciousness, inefficiency and increased use of alcohol and drugs. These, in turn, can lead to far worse outcomes in terms of career, self-image, physical health, depression and personal success. Beth McMurtrie writes in The Chronicle of Higher Education, “Burnout is a problem in academe even in the best of times. Shrinking budgets, growing workloads, and job insecurity in a profession where self-sufficiency is both expected and prized put many faculty members at risk before Covid-19 placed higher education on even shakier footing.”

In EdSurge, Kevin R. McClure writes, “It’s not a question of whether higher education institutions will see a significant uptick in burnout among staff, faculty and graduate students this fall. The more important question is how college leaders will address it.” McClure suggests that campuses break the “silence and stigma” of burnout on campus. We need to simplify work where possible and find flexible solutions. We must be alert to signs of burnout in our colleagues. We must take actions to head off this epidemic that is riding on the back of the pandemic on our campuses. We must be proactive to avoid the huge toll that may be taken on co-workers, their careers and their future.

Of course, the peer-reviewed research on the mental health toll of the pandemic is just beginning to emerge, given the time required for studies, peer reviews and publications. But the early findings are not good. In “Prevalence of Depression Symptoms in US Adults Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic,” a sharp increase in depression is reported. And in the American Journal of Drug and Alcohol Abuse, binge drinking is reported to have soared.

I am sounding the alarm now to alert readers that the next three months may bring struggle and harm to our faculty, staff and students. In these dark winter days and nights until spring when meaningful deployment of vaccines arrives in March, a grim toll will be taken. Burnout will spread, bringing depression, frustration and dismay among the most dedicated people at your university. Productivity will fall, judgment will fail and absenteeism will rise. All of this will take place as budgets, programs and personnel are inevitably cut due to the direct and indirect impact of the pandemic.

It will require a heroic effort to head off this shadow of the deadly pandemic. Who is leading the effort at your campus to maintain morale, bring sensible flexibility to rules, empower employees to pursue efficiencies and proactively intervene to lift up faculty, staff and students who are falling victim to burnout and looming depression?

This article marks Ray’s 200th edition of his “Online: Trending Now” blog posts.

This article was originally published in Inside Higher Ed’s Transforming Teaching & Learning blog.

This past spring semester marked a heroic response to the coronavirus that prompted radical change in the mode of delivery of much of higher education — a change that will continue to influence the way learning is accessed from this point forward. So, what did we learn?

First and foremost, we learned that we must be prepared for future pandemics, natural disasters or other breakdowns that disrupt our educational institutions and systems. Further, we learned that, in this instance, we were prepared to launch remote learning initiatives across the country to help protect our students and staff while delivering the curriculum, albeit in some cases in less than optimal presentations. We now have models upon which we must improve and expand to assure continuity of curriculum delivery in cases of disruptions.

Second, we learned that during such a disaster as this one that has claimed more than a quarter of a million lives, and caused massive disruption with mental health effects in the lives of students, faculty and staff, the mental health ramifications continue. They are not fully recognized and reported. They vary widely depending upon family/social bubbles, age and social disposition. A whole host of mental health support sites and referral services are available, but it is unclear if these fully meet the need.

Most effective faculty practices of student engagement, active learning, simulations, compassion and close attention to student well-being have been practiced by experienced online learning faculty members for many years. However, higher education faculty members are not universally grounded in these approaches and practices. Yet, the faculty are now on the front line of monitoring student behaviors that on campus had been observed by resident advisers, campus health services and other professionals who in normal conditions pay attention to student well-being.

We found that most but not all of our students had ready access to at least smartphone broadband access to learning management systems. Nevertheless, expansion of wireless and cable access to meet everyone’s needs is required. Efforts in this area continue with 5G, 10G and the addition of Starlink and other satellite-based systems that are less vulnerable to the challenges that geography and rural population density present.

We know now that faculty and staff members are not immune from the impact of the pandemic. We are poised on a tidal wave of burnout. Faculty and staff have been working extra hours and extra days, nonstop, in preparing first for remote learning, then more robust online learning. As Colleen Flaherty writes in Inside Higher Ed, “Faculty Pandemic Stress Is Chronic Now“:

The early days of the pandemic took a toll on faculty members, but for many, peak stress is now, according to a new study of faculty mental health from Course Hero. Researchers for the study website surveyed hundreds of faculty members on and off the tenure track, across institution types, this fall. The findings suggest that faculty worries about the pandemic have morphed into chronic stress — with serious implications for professors’ mental health, their students and the profession as COVID-19 drags on.

So, we learned that there is a need for stress and mental health support for all in the education process: students, faculty and staff. We must be careful as we enter 2021 to assure that these needs are met.

We now have at least three different vaccines in the pipeline that promise to help protect against the current version of the COVID virus. Traditional treatments are improving with lowered death rates. New antibody treatments have been given emergency approvals for use. Yet the production, deployment and administration of these vaccines and treatments to billions of people worldwide will take a year or more. We still face a remote spring and likely summer ahead for higher education in the U.S.

Is your institution prepared to implement the practices and policies that we learned in this human disaster?

Will you implement training and support for the effective teaching practices we have learned? Will your institution address the brewing mental health issues? In the fall semester and beyond, how will our higher education model have changed? Will HyFlex, blended and online alternatives be offered for those faculty and students who may not feel safe to return to the classroom? Will your institution be prepared for the next natural/human disaster?