California Helps Schools Treat Kids with Trauma Before a Crisis Occurs. Other States Should Give Students This Kind of Support
February 6, 2019
By: Alfredo Rubalcava
Source: The 74
Twenty years ago, a groundbreaking study by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention revealed the ubiquity of childhood trauma and its long-term impact on health and behavior. I was in my sixth year of college at the time, struggling to focus on my coursework as I recovered from years of watching my alcoholic father physically and psychologically abuse my mother, while worrying that my brother would overdose from drugs as he attempted to cope with the dysfunction in our home. I would have been a perfect subject for the researchers.
In the decades since, experts have found that childhood trauma is more prevalent in low-income communities of color and can leave children with disabling forms of anxiety and depression. As any educator knows, these emotional burdens interfere with children’s ability to learn and grow.