A Lot of Students Have Really Declined

I hope I don't sound like those "holier than thou" profs, but I need to say this: COVID has really made some students get lazy and more entitled. I am an undergraduate myself, and I have been TAing for four semesters now. Most of my students are great or they don't cause any problems. But this semester I definitely had a few bad apples. For context, I TA general physics classes meant for biology and chemistry majors. I try to understand that taking a physics class after lots of biology can be challenging for them and they do not know as much math, and I try to be cognizant of their situation, but some of the behaviors and excuses I have seen are just completely ridiculous.

One student did not know how to use the chain rule when a semester of calculus 1 is a prerequisite and then complained how unfair it was they have to know how to take derivatives. I explained that yes they need to know how to do derivatives as that's a prereq for this course and it is their responsibility to review those derivative rules if they feel like they need to brush up.

Another student got a question completely wrong, so I explained the correct answer and why they were wrong and they said "Yeah obviously we know that; we're not stupid." They then proceeded to call me rude and condescending for correcting their mistake. I even asked how they felt I could be more conscious while correcting them and the student couldn't tell me anything.

A student gave me a very low score in TA evaluations because they felt it was unfair that they have to solve the workshop problems themselves and that I should be doing them on the board for everyone (yes someone actually said this). I decided to write more setups and important concepts and equations on the board to help, but some students called me lazy and distant for only doing this because "he doesn't want to do the work."

This is the one that takes the cake though. I had to grade their participation in workshop. The professor told the TAs to have 5 out of 10 points for just attending and the other 5 points for how much they participated. This one group of students did not participate that much, so I did not give them 10/10 on their workshop grade. They emailed me saying how they feel that my grade for them was so unfair. I did not have much faith in how much work they did, so I wanted to see if they could back it up, so I told them I would raise their grades if they could show me written work for the workshops and gave them a deadline. Most of the group followed through, and i raised their grades accordingly. Then they responded saying how they feel that it is so "hurtful" that I didn't raise their grades even more. One student did not make the deadline and emailed me a day after, and I just said "No I'm sorry. You were late, so I will not be raising your grade," and then I got a nasty email after that as well.

While most students I work with are great, I keep seeing an increase in this ridiculous entitled behavior, and this is ridiculous. Is anyone else seeing this, or does this seem to only be a problem at my college?

Edit: For the comments describing how COVID has been very rough for them, I can sympathize. COVID has definitely affected many students negatively and caused them struggle. Most profs and TAs are aware of this. That said, I think it is best to email profs and TAs and explain your situation and explain the ways you need support, not make entitled demands and not put in any kind of effort. Many students have constructively talked to me about this, and we were able to find a solution. But if you just use COVID as an end all be all excuse, especially for poor behavior, I'm not going to have a lot of sympathy for you.