I’ve seen a lot of posts since the shooting at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School. Some posts offer prayer, some call for tougher gun laws, and some call for better parenting skills. I will always give prayer to those in need and suffering (and prayer to those who are not in need and suffering), I will also call for tougher gun laws (a nineteen year old should not have the rights to purchase an AK-47 type rifle). The call for better parenting is not new but is seemingly becoming more evident, but let me call your attention to this generation of young people and what they are living through and how our world has changed since we were young. Anxiety among young people is the highest mental health issue today. According to a study done by the University of Iowa, anxiety has surpassed depression exponentially since 1996. Why 1996? It was two years after the cell phone was introduced. A study released in Jan 2018 by Barna Research Group reveals that this generation is more emotionally affected by social media than any other generation who are also online. Our young adults are dealing with so much in today’s world they don’t have time to deal with problems, much less think, social media takes up a majority of their time.
One solution to helping our children and to help prevent tragedies like what happened at Stoneman Douglas High School, Marshall County High School, and other school shootings is to hire more school counselors, to improve the ratio of counselors to students. According to the nprED article “With Hundreds of Students, School Counselors Just Try to Stay Afloat” (February, 2018), the average counselor to student ratio in the United States is 482 students, the average should be no more than 150 students. Both secondary schools as well as universities are reporting a growing number of students seeking mental health care and schools have an insufficient number of counselors to meet the needs of their students. Instead of saturating our schools with teachers carrying guns, lets help the problem at its source and help those students before its too late.
Our schools today still rank students, the best and the brightest always come out on top. And if you struggle in any grade, with any subject, you are left behind, remember the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001? There was a reason for the Act. Our schools are still operating under the tradition of “survival of the fittest” but we must change the school culture and attitude of “we must make or children fit to survive”! This means we must equip our students with the soft skills needed to survive and move on when they graduate, we need to look five years beyond high school graduation to ensure their success. We must develop a school culture that helps students discover the leader in themselves so they are able to deal with the challenges that they face in trying to reach their goals. Dr. Tim Elmore has researched how to communicate with this generation’s youth. Dr. Tim Elmore’s Habitudes program is a big part of our “Balanced Student” program at the Craft Academy. I invite you to read one of his books, “Generation IY” or “Marching off the Map” if you want to make a significant change in a young person’s life.
The Prepared Student 