By Richard Mendel, Photo: Getty Images, The 74, March 29, 2022
The COVID-19 pandemic has been a nightmare for teenagers.
The U.S. surgeon general and the American Academy of Pediatrics recently declared a nationwide adolescent mental health crisis, as did the president of the United States. Academic achievement tests show wholesale learning loss. School attendance has plummeted. And these difficulties are being felt most among students who were already behind before COVID — youth of color, those with disabilities and those from low-income communities. Though no reliable statistics are yet available, anecdotal evidence indicates that — as the National Association of School Psychologists predicted — the pandemic has sparked a substantial escalation in behavioral problems inside the nation’s schools.
Through the $122 billion infusion of federal support for public education in the American Rescue Plan, Congress provided an opportunity for education agencies and their community partners to address those challenges. Indeed, as The Sentencing Project documented in its 2021 Back-to-School Action Guide, these Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) dollars — if spent wisely — could help create a new normal in public education that supports student well-being, narrows achievement gaps and closes the school-to-prison pipeline.
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