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As U.S. schools shuttered, student mental health cratered, survey finds

reuters.com

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Re: As U.S. schools shuttered, student mental health cratered, survey finds

#181

Post by easton »

lupire wrote: post #145
thaumasiotes wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Matt Yglesias wrote an interesting (non-paywalled) piece about this: https://www.slowboring.com/p/school-closure > in the actual United States of America, it’s Congress that can write huge checks; it’s mostly states who write rules for restaurants; and schools are a local responsibility — often run by special purpose school boards that have no other governing powers. Given that Congress did not appropriate funds for…

Why can't CA bail out restaurants? Because they are afraid to raise taxes on tech billionaires who made a fortune during the pandemic?

Because any raise of taxes would accelerate the conversations happening at every tech company in CA as to whether or not they really need to be there now that they worked remote. Unless Tim Cook's taxes can personally pay for it (since Apple's staying because of their big new building), this isn't a good time to be raising taxes.

Re: As U.S. schools shuttered, student mental health cratered, survey finds

#182

Post by _Microft »

Mediterraneo10 wrote: post #140
_Microft wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The length of lockdowns is the problem, here in Germany at least. An even harder lockdown limited in length would have most likely achieved better control of the pandemic than the on-going half-measures and we would have been out of it earlier as well.

The problem with a harder lockdown limited in length is that Germany is a member of Schengen, so even if Germany largely eradicated COVID within its borders, it could then be reimported from another EU country that hadn’t been as locked down. You might advocate for Germany closing its borders earlier and for longer, and forcing police registration of fellow Europeans, but personally I think that is horrible. I see re…

I am as pro-European as they get but what should we do when things go downhill as they did in e.g. Belgium or Czechia? We have no influence on preventive measures there. All we can do is to deal with it and to be as little affected by it as possible. Beside that, a more fine-grained control than national borders would be preferrable anyways in that case, so it would be not only be about locking fellow Europeans out but fellow Germans as well. There is no base in law for that though and attempts to limit visits between federal states have therefore been anulled by courts. Can we agree that it is not an easy situation?

Re: As U.S. schools shuttered, student mental health cratered, survey finds

#183

Post by superflit »

axiolite wrote: post #161
superflit wrote: post #64

That was the reason I decided to go in debt to pay for private schools. Not only my kid was able to go to real live class but was more social and not isolated. Is it worth it? Well I have 40K in Debt. My values are that it is worth. Now working 2-3 jobs to pay it all.

Have to wonder if your kid would be happier to spend more time with you, instead of you being away all the time, working extra hours to pay for the private school. Perhaps you could have organized free/cheap social events, instead of paying for them in the form of a private school.

It is not like I sent him to live inside the school.

School is from 8:00 to 15:00 with breaks.

I deliver and pick up him everyday.

We don't have the luxury of not "doing" nothing or having "free/cheap" social events.

We just moved and have no social/familiar network. The other option is to be isolated in a apartment watching tv. Both parents need to work.

I DO understand parents that were afraid and did not send their kids to the school. But in my case the isolation would be worse.

Kids are *very* social they *need* it.

There is no "perfect" solution only what is best at moment.

Re: As U.S. schools shuttered, student mental health cratered, survey finds

#184

Post by runjake »

Not only mental health, but things like basic nutrition, hygiene, and medical care, as well.

Many school districts recognized this and offered free meals, healthcare and other services throughout the pandemic. But this still requires parents motivated enough to take their kids by a meal pick-up site.

Working with some of these parents throughout the pandemic, some of them (mostly dads) did not know the correct spelling of their child's first name and/or did not know their child's birthday. This wasn't one or two people, this was many.

Except for those who put in the work, such handing out meals or providing medical care for essentially free, "Think of the children" is largely a lie in America.

Re: As U.S. schools shuttered, student mental health cratered, survey finds

#185

Post by GiorgioG »

Sample size of 2 children (my 9 year old and 14 year old): neither want to go back to in-person school. In-person school can create its own set of mental health issues. My 14 year old socializes on her phone. The 9 year old is a type 1 diabetic and out of an abundance of caution we pulled him out a month before the school system decided to go remote learning last year. He loathes going back. Neither of my kids are antisocial, but they prefer not dealing with social drama that pervades school.

I don't think my kids have had their growth stunted because of our isolation. Quite the contrary, the 14 year old has had time to mature away from school without the influences of less-than-ideal schoolmates. On the other hand, they've had to learn to learn by themselves sometimes when they're stuck and can't get help (and can't wait for us to finish working.) Learning to help oneself is more valuable than anything I ever learned at school.

Our 9 year old will probably be homeschooled through June '22 because his age bracket won't be able to get a Covid-19 vaccine until early 2022. He's already asking if we can homeschool him beyond that.

It's not all black and white and there is no one-size fits all.

Re: As U.S. schools shuttered, student mental health cratered, survey finds

#186

Post by soupbowl »

croes wrote: post #175
1experience wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please tell me where are all these deaths in Sweden, Belarus, Brazil, Florida... https://www.statista.com/statistics/525353/sweden-number-of-... So you're telling me that in places like Brazil more people are being traumatized by deaths in overloaded hospitals compared to Westerners (who are less traumatized) thanks to a year of isolation? uhmm https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcAYObnlehE&t=2623s https://www.youtube.c…

Ask yourself, what's the bigger trauma for you. Your partner dies of COVID-19, you can't see your parents for a year.

COVID is not a death sentence for the majority of people that get it.

Re: As U.S. schools shuttered, student mental health cratered, survey finds

#187

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

happytoexplain wrote: post #23
cassalian wrote: post #9

Anyone else find it strange that a country that has often fallen in line with "think of the children" arguments for hypothetical dangers appears to be completely uncaring about very real dangers of social isolation that are impacting our youth?

I don't understand - are you implying that the act of deciding to have a long lockdown necessitates that the decision makers do not care about children, or are there specifics you are leaving unsaid?

Many decisions about what precisely needs to be locked down seem to have been made without much concern for the needs and interests of children. In the summer, for example, quite a few areas opened stores before playgrounds and restaurants before schools.

Re: As U.S. schools shuttered, student mental health cratered, survey finds

#188

Post by monocasa »

axiolite wrote: post #148
thaumasiotes wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Matt Yglesias wrote an interesting (non-paywalled) piece about this: https://www.slowboring.com/p/school-closure > in the actual United States of America, it’s Congress that can write huge checks; it’s mostly states who write rules for restaurants; and schools are a local responsibility — often run by special purpose school boards that have no other governing powers. Given that Congress did not appropriate funds for…

> Given that Congress did not appropriate funds for a bar and restaurant bailout, I don’t think it’s crazy that governors mostly decided they had to reopen their restaurants. What you are talking about? There were multiple rounds of several federal bailouts for small businesses affected by COVID-19: https://www.sba.gov/funding-programs/loans/covid-19-relief-o... https://ilsr.org/information-on-covid-19-small-business…

There's a lot of data that small business overwhelmingly didn't get that stimulus; they were just the excuse, but systematically missed out on it.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/the-stimulus-money...

Re: As U.S. schools shuttered, student mental health cratered, survey finds

#189

Post by [deleted] »

germinalphrase wrote: post #13
cassalian wrote: post #9

Anyone else find it strange that a country that has often fallen in line with "think of the children" arguments for hypothetical dangers appears to be completely uncaring about very real dangers of social isolation that are impacting our youth?

The US federal gov’t spends about 3x as much on those over the age of 65 than it does those under the age of 18 (including transfer payments to parents of those children)[0]. Personally, I think that should be flipped, but kid’s don’t vote. [0] https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/23x...

[deleted]

Re: As U.S. schools shuttered, student mental health cratered, survey finds

#190

Post by xenihn »

perardi wrote: post #6

The sun is shining, the vaccines are flowing, I can eat inside now, I am feeling optimistic today. But on my grey days: I wonder how long the mental health trauma of all this will last. Besides school-age depression, there was a noticeable uptick in drug overdoses. ( https://www.statnews.com/2021/02/16/as-pandemic-ushered-in-i... ) And, anecdotally, I have several friends and acquaintances who developed severe drug i…

I'm still traumatized by how difficult it was to find a job after college in the wake of the great recession. I haven't been unemployed since I started working in tech, and I'm going to make over 300k this year (half of which will go to taxes....), but I still feel like I'm constantly in danger of losing my job, that I'll never find another one afterwards, and I'll become financially insecure again and maybe even homeless.

I don't think this feeling will ever go away, even though it''s completely unfounded. I also can't bring myself to commit to a mortgage even though I can more than afford it at this point. I should have bought my first home years ago, but couldn't bring myself to do it because I always feel like the economy is on the brink of collapse.

I feel so much compassion for people who have trouble finding their first jobs, or lose their jobs during all of this, because I went through that. You feel so helpless and worthless. At least we have the stimulus checks and rent moratoriums this time around. But I feel like we're going to need them for years if we actually want to take care of those who have been affected.

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