Geeking-Out February 8, 2021

Partly hidden by isolation, many of the nation’s schoolchildren struggle with mental health

Curated by Adrian Ruiz

In the last few weeks my conversations with friends and colleagues have been dominated by how are our young people doing? The news is not good and should worry all of us. “Mental health problems account for a growing proportion of children’s visits to hospital emergency rooms, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. From March, when the pandemic was declared, to October, the figure was up 31 percent for those 12 to 17 years old and 24 percent for children ages 5 to 11 compared with the same period in 2019.” In the coming weeks YDN will release the answers to our culture & climate questionnaire that was responded to by over 450 youth throughout the Sacramento region. The result are eerily similar to what you will read in this article. YDN will also release what those youth said about how to bounce back and what they need from us right now… Hint: it’s not more zoom curriculum delivery.