Recent Incidents of Violence in Mass. Schools Raise Questions for Parents

From highschool stabbings in Brockton, Malden and Methuen; to a pupil attacked by classmates in Fall River; to a doable hate crime in a Wilmington Excessive College toilet; to fights at excessive colleges in Haverhill, Medford and Lawrence; there have been a lot of current violent incidents at Massachusetts colleges.

“Our youngsters are emotionally uncooked proper now, and so they’re crying out for assist,” mentioned Keri Rodrigues, founding father of Massachusetts Dad and mom United. “If you see bullying, and also you see this sort of exercise happening, there’s one thing happening past the floor.”

She says college students are battling psychological well being as they emerge from the pandemic.

“For the final 24 months, dad and mom and households and communities have been actually sounding the alarm, saying our children will not be alright,” mentioned Rodrigues. “This can be a psychological well being disaster.”

Nonetheless, regardless of all of the high-profile incidents, it is too early to inform how the 2021-2022 college 12 months will look in comparison with previous years with regards to college violence.

“There are extra tales popping out lately about college violence and aggression occurring in class, however we simply do not but have good knowledge to know if these are anecdotes or if these are traits that we must be involved about,” mentioned Boston College Wheelock School of Schooling Professor Jennifer Greif Inexperienced, who researches college psychological well being and bullying. “I feel what we do know fairly clearly is that there was an uptick in psychological well being issues amongst college students and the necessity for psychological well being helps and companies.”

She says performing out is a standard response to trauma, which might be tied, in lots of instances, to the pandemic.

“It may be tougher to maneuver again into their typical surroundings,” mentioned Inexperienced. “And the expectation that they will return to high school, and be sitting in lecture rooms, and able to study, could not match the place lots of them are proper now and what they want of their lives.”