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If you’re an art school student or a recent high school grad and you’re considering taking a gap year, check out this thread. Particularly if you want to work in animation, I have some advice on what kind of online classes to take to still get an art school experience.
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Disclaimer: I’m one person with my own privilege and biases, so please don’t take this as gospel. Still, a lot of academic advisors are going to try to convince students that their only option is to return to school, and that’s not true. You have options.
Disclaimer #2: Unfortunately, this advice probably won’t be helpful to international students. International students are dealing with an administration that is intentionally cruel and hostile towards them. LRT has information and resources if you want to help.
First, talk to your academic advisor and figure out what your college’s policies are on taking a gap year. Higher education is panicking right now and they will do their best to convince you to stay, but it’s still important to get all the info you can.
Most art schools let you take liberal arts classes at a community college and transfer those credits over. Ask your academic advisor which classes you can take at a community college. This way, when you return to college, you’ll have some required credits out of the way.
Most art schools will make you take foundational art classes: figure drawing, drawing 1, color theory, sculpture, landscape painting, etc. Most community colleges have these classes, but if that doesn’t work for you, My pinned tweet is a thread of recommended online art classes.
I HIGHLY recommend taking a figure drawing class, it’s probably the most important class you can take if you want to work in animation. And yes, even if you already took foundational classes your freshman year, you can still benefit from taking them again.
If you can, take at least one animation specific class: traditional animation, storyboarding, visual development, whatever it is that interests you. Most community colleges don’t have good animation classes, so definitely check out my list of recommended online classes.
For quick reference: Concept Design Academy, CGMA, AnimationMentor, Schoolism, IAnimate, New Master’s Academy
I’m a sucker for a good old liberal arts education. Art history and film history are very beneficial to an animation career, but just find subjects that interest you. I learned more about animation from writing classes than classes where I learned rigging 
And finally, don’t beat yourself up if this year doesn’t work out perfectly for you. This sucks. It sucks that you have to choose between your education and your health. It’s important to admit that it sucks. I promise nobody is living their best life right now.
