Living and Learning Through Everyday Hurricanes
Hurricanes and other disasters seem to be a common occurrence across the United States these days. From Harvey in Texas, Irma in Florida, Maria in Puerto Rico and the wildfires in California, we have seen children and families suffering great anguish and trauma.
Amidst the many challenges created by these disasters, one community institution has stood tall. School buildings have remained open whenever possible, serving as centers of community. They have been shelters for homeless families, food distribution sites, centers for health and social services and places where communities sustain themselves through music, dance and games as people come to grips with the harsh realities of their lives.
Belva Parrish, a school counselor in Houston, told NPR, “Banding together, being a place where students feel safe and they know they have a voice to be heard will go a long way toward helping them.”
In Puerto Rico, where most schools have been devastated, the Jose Severo Quinones Public School now serves as food bank, health clinic, child care facility and focal point for psychological services for children, their families and other community residents.
Children are especially at risk from these natural disasters. “According to experts, the chaos and upheaval brought on by extreme events can have an especially negative impact on children. Hurricane Harvey has put students in its path at greater risk for symptoms of anxiety and depression than they’d otherwise be…generally speaking a lack of stability has been proven to have adverse effects on kids’ academic performance,” Hayley Glater wrote in The Atlantic. She went on to say, “the emotional and academic impacts of the natural disaster could plague students’ psyches and school successes for years to come.”
But serious trauma affects students outside disaster zones as well. Ten percent of New York City’s public schools children have been homeless in the past year, according to a recent New York Times report – that’s more than 100,000 students. And an even higher percentage of children and youth nationally experience trauma says the National Traumatic Stress Network. Nearly 5 million children live in Appalachia, the epicenter of our nation’s opioid crisis. And for children in our cities, violence is an all-too-common occurrence. Many other data points related to poverty, food insecurity and lack of opportunity could be added to the list.
Weather-related disasters just underscore and shine a vivid spotlight on the harsh realities of life that harm far too many of our children who are living and working hard to learn through the hurricanes— literal and figurative.
Americans understand this challenge. An overwhelming 92 percent of Americans say schools should offer after-school activities; 87 percent support mental health services in schools; 79 percent want general health services; and 65 percent say schools should offer dental services, according to the 49th annual PDK poll.
Parents and families know that students not only need a strong and engaging academic program but they also need health and social supports and multiple opportunities to develop their gifts and talents, not just in reading and math.
Encouragingly, Houston Superintendent David Carranza told NPR the district will be creating more community schools—public schools that identify student and family needs in housing, healthcare, jobs, food and mental health through partnerships with community-based non-profits, government agencies and business. He joins thousands of superintendents, mayors, United Ways, higher education institutions and others across the country using the partnership approach of community schools to better support their students as they face tough realities.
It shouldn’t take a natural disaster to wake people up to this common-sense and research-backed approach. Educators, children and families in Puerto Rico, Texas, Florida and California surely face huge challenges. But so do their peers in every other state in the union—city, rural and yes, suburban.
It shouldn’t require a hurricane or forest fire for us to have the same acute compassion for the well-being of all children, regardless of factors like race, class, disability or gender that we show in disasters.
When the community rallies around its public schools, schools can integrate powerful learning experiences, provide much-needed health and social supports and foster strong family and community engagement so students and families thrive. We see it every day in communities ranging from Evansville, Ind., to Baltimore, Md., from Asheville, N.C., to Salt Lake, Utah, from Sun Prairie, Wis., to Peoria, Ill., and from Albuquerque to Houston.
Schools and their partners in these communities are creating real paths to opportunity and equity even as their students are facing real—and proverbial—hurricanes.
Jose Munoz, is the Director of the Coalition for Community Schools. Martin Blank is a Senior Fellow and former Director of the Coalition.
