Saturday Nov 2, 2024
Saturday Nov 2, 2024

Youth mental health in crisis


Nepalnews
AP
2022 Aug 31, 19:22, CECILIA, Ky.
A student at Lakewood Elementary School in Cecilia, Ky., uses her laptop to participate in an emotional check-in at the start of the school day, Thursday. (AP Photo)

“It’s great to see you. How are you feeling?” chirps a cheery voice on her laptop screen. It asks her to click an emoji matching her state of mind: Happy. Sad. Worried. Angry. Frustrated. Calm. Silly. Tired.

Depending on the answer, Leah, 9, gets advice from a cartoon avatar on managing her mood and a few more questions: Have you eaten breakfast? Are you hurt or sick? Is everything OK at home? Is someone at school being unkind? Today, Leah chooses “silly,” but says she struggled with sadness during online learning.

At Lakewood Elementary School, all 420 students will start their days the same way this year. The rural Kentucky school is one of thousands across the country using the technology to screen students’ state of mind and alert teachers to anyone struggling.

In some ways, this year’s back-to-school season will restore a degree of pre-pandemic normalcy: Most districts have lifted mask mandates, dropped COVID vaccine requirements and ended rules on social distancing and quarantines.

But many of the pandemic’s longer-lasting impacts remain a troubling reality for schools. Among them: the harmful effects of isolation and remote learning on children’s emotional well-being.

Student mental health reached crisis levels last year, and the pressure on schools to figure out solutions has never been greater. Districts across the country are using federal pandemic money to hire more mental health specialists, rolling out new coping tools and expanding curriculum that prioritizes emotional health.

Still, some parents don’t believe schools should be involved in mental health at all. So-called social-emotional learning, or SEL, has become the latest political flashpoint, with conservatives saying schools use it to promote progressive ideas about race, gender and sexuality, or that a focus on well-being takes attention from academics.

But at schools like Lakewood, educators say helping students manage emotions and stress will benefit them in the classroom and throughout life.

Angela Pike watches her fourth grade students at Lakewood Elementary School in Cecilia, Ky., as they use their laptops to participate in an emotional check-in at the start of the school day, Thursday. (AP Photo)
Angela Pike watches her fourth grade students at Lakewood Elementary School in Cecilia, Ky., as they use their laptops to participate in an emotional check-in at the start of the school day, Thursday. (AP Photo)

The school, in a farming community an hour’s drive south of Louisville, has used federal money to create “take-a-break” corners in each classroom. Students can rifle through a “self-regulation kit” with tips on deep breathing, squishy stress balls and acupuncture rings, said school counselor Shelly Kerr. The school plans to build a “Reset Room” this fall, part of an emerging national trend to create campus sanctuaries where students can go to decompress and speak with a counselor.

The online student screener Lakewood uses, called Closegap, helps teachers identify shy, quiet kids who might need to talk and would have otherwise gone unnoticed.

Closegap founder Rachel Miller launched the online platform in 2019 with a few schools and saw interest explode after the pandemic hit. This year, she said, more than 3,600 U.S schools will be using the technology, which has free and premium versions.

The pandemic magnified the fragility of mental health among American youth, who had been experiencing a rise in depression, anxiety and suicidal thoughts for years, experts say. A recent report issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found 44% of high school students said they experienced “ persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness ” during the pandemic, with girls and LGBTQ youth reporting the highest levels of poor mental health and suicide attempts.

Statuettes of meditating monkeys sit on a table at Venado Middle School's Well Space in Irvine, Calif. (AP Photo)
Statuettes of meditating monkeys sit on a table at Venado Middle School's Well Space in Irvine, Calif. (AP Photo)

If a silver lining exists, the pandemic raised awareness of the crisis and helped de-stigmatize talking about mental health, while also bringing attention to schools’ shortcomings in handling it. President Joe Biden’s administration recently announced over $500 million to expand mental health services in the country’s schools, adding to federal and state money that has poured into schools to cope with pandemic-era needs.

Despite the unprecedented funding, schools are having trouble hiring counselors, mirroring the shortages in other American industries.

Goshen Junior High School in northwest Indiana has been struggling to fill a vacancy of a counselor who left last year, when student anxiety and other behavioral problems were “off the charts,” said Jan Desmarais-Morse, one of two counselors left at the school, with caseloads of 500 students each.

Another challenge for schools: identifying struggling children before they’re in emotional crisis. At the Houston Independent School District, one of the largest in the country with 277 schools and nearly 200,000 students, students are asked each morning to hold up fingers showing how they feel. One finger means a child is hurting deeply; five means she or he feels great.

READ ALSO:

youth mental health in crisis emotional check-in Lakewood Elementary School online learning pre-pandemic normalcy emotional health SEL
Nepal's First Online News Portal
Published by Nepalnews Pvt Ltd
Editor: Raju Silwal
Information Department Registration No. 1505 / 076-77

Contact

Kathmandu, Nepal,


Newsroom
##

E-mail
nepalnewseditor@gmail.com

Terms of Use Disclaimer
© NepalNews. 2021 All rights reserved. | Nepal's First News Portal