Faculty members' anxieties about the coming semester abound. And while they may be able to rely on their institutions for support in matters of teaching, they remain very much on their own in dealing with the personal costs of the pandemic.

This fact is particularly searing to professors with young children: six months into the coronavirus's stranglehold on the U.S., babies, toddlers and kids are still out of childcare and school in many places. This means that professors are going to have to pull off the same miracle they did at the end of the spring semester at least one more time: shepherd their students through while simultaneously trying to manage their own children's schooling, meals, moods and more at home.

"It's insane that we're not having collective conversations about all the families that are facing this," said Maia Cucchiara, associate professor of urban education and school leadership at Temple University. "Universities are in crisis and even the universities that will make it through this are struggling mightily. So I'm certainly not saying this is a task universities should be taking on. But it is a task someone should be taking on."

Cucchiara's own two kids are teenagers already, so they're not in diapers, crying or asking for snacks in the middle of her Zoom meetings or remote class sessions -- all things that make the most unflappable professors sweat. But her kids have their own complex needs. One of their schools will be entirely online this fall.

As Cucchiara put it, "It's a psychic drain to watch your kids sit inside all day. Even if you have time to do your work, it's just deeply unsettling to know that even if your kids are fine, this is so not good for them."