Music may have the power to soothe, but for more than a week, those who teach it have been scrambling to adjust to the new reality of COVID-19 and online instruction.

While adapting his classes as online lessons, Prof. John Shirley decided to weave in some normalcy and walked to South Campus, camera in hand.

As public schools across the country began closing to prevent the rapid spread of COVID-19, Clinical Prof. of Education Michelle Scribner-MacLean watched as teachers, education companies and nonprofits posted educational resources online.

After some hunting, you find a metered parking space in downtown Lowell. But when you go to drop a few quarters in the nearest payment kiosk, the machine doesn’t work. Should you find another kiosk? Should you leave a note on your dashboard and hope you don’t get a ticket? 

It can be a familiar dilemma for anyone who uses Lowell’s solar-powered parking kiosks, which were installed in 176 locations throughout the city in 2012 but have proven less than reliable in recent years.

AMHERST, Mass. – When cocaine kingpin Pablo Escobar was shot dead in 1993, the four hippos he brought to his private zoo in Colombia were left behind in a pond on his ranch. Since then, their numbers have grown to an estimated 80-100, and the giant herbivores have made their way into the country’s rivers.

AMHERST, Mass. – In an effort to combat a major source of serious bacterial infections, chemical engineers Jessica Schiffman and Lauren B. Andrews at the University of Massachusetts Amherst are studying how bacteria attach themselves to polymer materials used in biomedical devices such as catheters, implants, wound dressings and contact lenses.

AMHERST, Mass. – A slender little fish called the sand lance plays a big role as “a quintessential forage fish” for puffins, terns and other seabirds, humpback whales and other marine mammals, and even bigger fish such as Atlantic sturgeon, cod and bluefin tuna in the Gulf of Maine and northwest Atlantic Ocean.

Music can emerge from some unusual places. Elissa Johnson-Green knows that sometimes, it just needs to be found and pieced together.

Now that schools across the country have moved all courses online in an effort to stem the coronavirus pandemic, many students are getting their first taste of virtual learning. 

Around the world, people are trying to adapt to the new reality of life in the time of coronavirus. It’s an ever-shifting landscape of uncertainty, dominated by an unseen enemy. Many people who are hunkering down and practicing social distancing are turning to the arts to reduce isolation and soothe the mind and soul. 

UMass Lowell faculty, going through their own adjustments during this time of disruption, have some advice for those looking for entertainment, diversion, enrichment or simply an escape.  

In a video recorded on Monday, March 23, Chancellor Michael F. Collins is urging members of the UMass Medical School community to continue working closely together, even as many do their jobs from home in keeping with Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker’s state of emergency declaration during the COVID-19 pandemic.