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When the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released its Youth Risk Behavior Survey report in March, outlining the severity of the nation’s adolescent mental health crisis, building school connectedness was a cornerstone of its recommended solution. It even outlined school-based suggestions for improving curricula. But this approach to alleviating severe mental health concerns, complex trauma, sexual violence and more rests squarely on the shoulders of educators.
Putting overworked, underpaid and imperiled teachers on yet another front line cannot be the solution. Instead, school communities need a collaborative solution that incorporates administrators, parents, coaches and other education professionals, and that is ultimately led by those most impacted by this crisis: girls, especially girls of color and LGBTQ+ youth.
The National Sexual Violence Resource Center reports 56% of girls in grades 7 to 12 have experienced sexual harassment — which is the No. 1 reason that girls in our programs tell us that they don’t feel connected at school — and when they go to teachers and staff for help, they aren’t believed or supported. This is especially true for Black girls, who are confronted not only by the misogyny common in high school culture, but by racism and gender bias in a school system where the teaching force is 80% white. They are victims of peers and adults who see them as older than they actually are; experience adultification or what the girls describe as sexualization; are ignored, disbelieved, blamed, disproportionately suspended and punished for not coming forward in the right way at the right time, or for using the right tone of voice.
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