Here’s the new edition of The Weekly Connect. Check it out and sign up to have it delivered to your inbox!
Here are some of the things we’ve been reading about this week:
Social media bans alone won’t improve mental health, students and advocates say.
A survey finds that most LGBTQ+ students’ mental health has been impacted by recent policies.
How a Connecticut middle school banned cell phones.
To read more, click on the following links.
Continue reading “The Weekly Connect 5/13/24”Here’s the new edition of The Weekly Connect. Check it out and sign up to have it delivered to your inbox!
Here are some of the things we’ve been reading about this week:
Schools across the country are facing declines in student enrollment.
Research questions the value of having states takeover school districts.
California launches new apps that provide mental health support for families and youth.
To read more, click on the following links.
Continue reading “The Weekly Connect 5/6/24”
In 2021, well into the pandemic, an alarm rang. The American Academy of Pediatrics declared a national emergency in child and adolescent mental health. Since then, students’ mental health needs have continued to alarm educators.
A recent National Center for Education Statistics survey found that “About 4 in 10 school leaders said they were ‘moderately’ or ‘extremely’ concerned about their students’ mental health (43 percent) and the mental health of their teachers or staff (41 percent).”
Here at City Connects, our Coordinators are addressing these needs, and as an organization we are reaffirming our longstanding commitment to focusing on students’ physical and mental health — one of the four domains in students’ lives that we look at, along with academics, social-emotional wellbeing, and family.
By focusing on the “whole child,” we take a broad view of how to support healthy child development and positive mental health. We recognize that access to opportunities like physical activities, a chance to learn a new skill, and places to build positive relationships with peers and caring adults create the conditions for students to successfully get through life’s challenges.
Today, City Connects Coordinators are seeing students navigate significant hurdles. Some have lost family members to Covid. Others face hunger, homelessness, and other challenges that come with poverty.
“I have seen more mental health challenges with middle schoolers,” Maggie Longsdorf, the coordinator at Risen Christ Catholic School in Minneapolis, says. “Kids have anxiety about the future and about where they are going to high school because in some of our families, parents haven’t gone to high school. There are a lot of new things.
Continue reading “Mental Health and Integrated Student Support”Here’s the new edition of The Weekly Connect. Check it out and sign up to have it delivered to your inbox!
Here are some of the things we’ve been reading about this week:
A federal study finds that the obstacles to implementing social-emotional learning curriculum include lack of time, funding, and teacher support.
Preschool enrollment of 3- and 4-year-olds hit an all-time high in the 2022-2023 school year. However the overall number of children enrolled is still lower than preschool levels.
Birdie’s Bookmobile brings the joy of reading to children in Detroit.
To read more, click on the following links.
Continue reading “The Weekly Connect 4/29/24”Earlier this month, the Mary E. Walsh Center for Thriving Children, the home of City Connects, hosted a webinar called “Helping Children Thrive in an Age of Uncertainty.”
The webinar is a dynamic conversation that addresses the question: “In this time of historic uncertainty and challenge, what does it mean for children to ‘thrive,’ and what will it take to promote thriving in enduring and equitable ways?”
The discussion draws on the work of talented academics and their visionary ideas of what thriving could mean. It touches on the importance of joy, flourishing, having the opportunity to dream, and how thriving could be a community-wide resource that community members share over the course of their lives.
Here at City Connects, these ideas are a crucial part of our model. Our coordinators focus on meeting students’ needs and on offering them compelling opportunities like music lessons and summer camp. The goal is to help children thrive in school, at home, and as they grow into adults.
Continue reading “A webinar explores how to help children thrive”Here’s the new edition of The Weekly Connect. Check it out and sign up to have it delivered to your inbox!
Here are some of the things we’ve been reading about this week:
A study finds that four-day school weeks have a significant negative impact on students’ math and reading performance.
As federal Covid funds run out, K-12 educators are skeptical about their schools’ financial futures.
In Indianapolis, a community organization helps a local school teach children to read.
To read more, click on the following links.
Continue reading “The Weekly Connect 4/22/24”Here’s the new edition of The Weekly Connect. Check it out and sign up to have it delivered to your inbox!
Here are some of the things we’ve been reading about this week:
School interventions that focus on strengthening relationships improve academics and attendance.
As Covid relief funding runs outs, schools face budget cuts.
A Brooklyn, N.Y., public school experiments with staying open for 12 hours a day to support working parents.
To read more, click on the following links.
Continue reading “The Weekly Connect 4/15/24”Here’s the new edition of The Weekly Connect. Check it out and sign up to have it delivered to your inbox!
Here are some of the things we’ve been reading about this week:
Free school meals may reduce childhood obesity.
Homeless infants and toddlers are largely not enrolled in early education programs that could provide benefits.
Vague school rules are at the root of millions of student suspensions.
To read more, click on the following links.
Continue reading “The Weekly Connect 4/8/24”
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