It seems like one of the root causes behind dreadful situations such as the one described in the article is that the various groups of actors in the system (students, school officials, teachers, parents, etc.) aren't in tune enough with each other. There are many nodes in the graph, but it's quite sparse.
Quotes from the article:
> "She’s referring to a series of chalk memorials that were drawn by students all over the Gunn campus after Cam’s death. Rather than leaving them up as a reminder of (or, school officials feared, an homage to) suicide’s lasting effects, the administration unceremoniously hosed them away within hours. The students were left feeling wronged, their voices and feelings silenced."
> Lisa hasn’t found the grief counselors provided by the school to be of much help. “They kind of, like, force you to talk to them,” she says, “but you don’t know them, and they don’t know you, and every time you get a brand-new person.”
> Kathleen Blanchard, the mother of Jean-Paul, who died in 2009, has some simple advice for parents: “Talk less. Listen more. Listen deeply.” She’s speaking at a community event to an auditorium full of parents who are wondering what, if any, signals she saw in her son. “He sent out signs to people by phone and online,” she says. “He even let people know that he intended to take his life. But they didn’t understand.”
There's a reason why pedagogies like Montessori/Waldorf/etc. schools tend to work well. The educators who designed those systems understood the importance of having tight feedback loops and small social groups for children to develop into fulfilled, productive citizens.
Having teachers who get to know the students over several years, in small classrooms, with healthy parental involvement, and school officials that are in tune with what's happening really does help. It's the kind of stuff that just seems like commons sense when you see it in practice, and yet the vast majority of our schools are diametrically opposed to that. It's really enraging: we know what the properties of good schools and good teachers are, and what the properties of bad schools and bad teachers are - and yet we ignore all of it and perpetuate a model that hasn't changed much in the past 200 years. Modern schools - and particularly middle and high schools - are a toxic environment in which it's surprising that some kids manage to flourish at all.
Like 'tokenadult said, it's unclear whether there is a statistical significance to the suicides. But hearing the students interviewed for the article, it's evident that they are deeply unhappy. When you observe the social structure they spend their lives in, with Silicon Valley overachiever culture added on top, it's not hard to see why.
Quotes from the article:
> "She’s referring to a series of chalk memorials that were drawn by students all over the Gunn campus after Cam’s death. Rather than leaving them up as a reminder of (or, school officials feared, an homage to) suicide’s lasting effects, the administration unceremoniously hosed them away within hours. The students were left feeling wronged, their voices and feelings silenced."
> Lisa hasn’t found the grief counselors provided by the school to be of much help. “They kind of, like, force you to talk to them,” she says, “but you don’t know them, and they don’t know you, and every time you get a brand-new person.”
> Kathleen Blanchard, the mother of Jean-Paul, who died in 2009, has some simple advice for parents: “Talk less. Listen more. Listen deeply.” She’s speaking at a community event to an auditorium full of parents who are wondering what, if any, signals she saw in her son. “He sent out signs to people by phone and online,” she says. “He even let people know that he intended to take his life. But they didn’t understand.”
There's a reason why pedagogies like Montessori/Waldorf/etc. schools tend to work well. The educators who designed those systems understood the importance of having tight feedback loops and small social groups for children to develop into fulfilled, productive citizens.
Having teachers who get to know the students over several years, in small classrooms, with healthy parental involvement, and school officials that are in tune with what's happening really does help. It's the kind of stuff that just seems like commons sense when you see it in practice, and yet the vast majority of our schools are diametrically opposed to that. It's really enraging: we know what the properties of good schools and good teachers are, and what the properties of bad schools and bad teachers are - and yet we ignore all of it and perpetuate a model that hasn't changed much in the past 200 years. Modern schools - and particularly middle and high schools - are a toxic environment in which it's surprising that some kids manage to flourish at all.
Like 'tokenadult said, it's unclear whether there is a statistical significance to the suicides. But hearing the students interviewed for the article, it's evident that they are deeply unhappy. When you observe the social structure they spend their lives in, with Silicon Valley overachiever culture added on top, it's not hard to see why.