Social Workers: The Silent Foundation of Schools
Send kids back to school they said. And so we did. But the emotional warfare of Covid can be worse than actually getting the virus. Just because kids are back to school full time (and in some places they aren’t), doesn’t mean kids suddenly turn a certain shade on the grill and are ready to be placed on the serving platter. Kids are still hurting, lost, stablizing. Parents are still fighting, divorcing, daycare is still a mess, routines are non-existent, alcoholics are raging and kids are holidng onto that little bit of board that saved Rose on the Titanic.
Enter Social Workers. The silent sunbeams from a tiny office in the school. The ones people forget about at group staff meetings, because they can be an outlier in a giant Chess match. Our district approved a social worker last year with our budget, and this year we were able to acquire another quiet angel. I have the luxury of benefitting from both. The one currently at my school has an office upstairs. She jets from one end of the hallway to another, meeting with kid after kid, sometimes they lurch out in front of her, already feeling the reprieve of her small office so they can say what they need to say. Some hold her hand on the way up the stairs, because they are four and hand holding to a kid experiencing grief or trauma transcends any germ control that Covid could ever demand.
When I began teaching, no one talked about social workers. Parent volunteers lined up for the fun events of kindergarten like they were being paid for it. I had help with photocopying, crafts, theme days, field trips, grading papers. Fast forward ten years, and teaching can be a lonely business, but so can being a kid. Four or five years ago I looked at my classroom and counted the amount of kids who had experienced trauma as an infant, as a toddler or perhaps even in the here and now. If I had a class of 15 kids, 5 or more of those kids were in that number. Of the 15, 6 of them were dependent on the school for meals and 4 students had parents who refused to meet with me at fall or spring conferences, never answering any of my correspondence. To make matters worse, we had acquired a Spurwink counselor who accepted Maine Care patients, but could not accept a lot of different health insurances. This seemed backwards to me when a parent who worked and had health insurance because of their employment, would then be refused mental health support for the child, but could use insurance to treat physical ailments. Enter school counselors, who can see students right in their school environment, right in their safe place. No payment required, no long drive in the vehicle, no Aetna refusals.
To the naysayers who vote down the school budget and complain of the tax increases, let me enlighten you to how much these school counselors really do. The ones I know see a lot of kids. I mean a lot a lot. Probably more than they are supposed too, and also on their lunch break. My son sees one, he speaks quite openly about. I think he believes she will join him on his high school graduation and on his job interviews. The one at our school is equally as remarkable. In between seeing kids, she makes times to pop into my classroom and ask how “our” kids are doing. We talk back and forth on their progress, we must resemble a little bit of divorced spouses, trading stories on what the other notices. All the while, the kiddo who is struggling benefits, because they can work on behaviors with the counselor and the teacher can be more aware and sensitive to struggles at home. It’s a complete win win for all involved.
What really sealed the deal for me though, was when I was struggling with my own mental health, my own family stuff, my own mental garbage can sealed shut with anxiety and exasperation and this silent worker checked in with me. I think I sat there for a two or three minutes. My mouth hung open, in utter disbelief, because yes we hired staff for this new position and yes they are doing wonders for these kids, and for parents, but it was never my understanding that teachers would find solace with their own mental health through this person. I had worked several days in a row supporting students with anxiety, hurt, anger etc. I thought it made sense to swallow all their problems and add them to my own, because there is always more room in that trash bag right? You can always squish down the debris if you kick hard enough. Needless to say this was a new wave idea for me. That someone would ask me how I was holding up and not in relation to curriculum or schedule changes, but really, like legit holding up, in one of the most challenging years of my teaching career. So yes, it is safe to say that social workers are not getting half the respect they deserve or even a quarter of the recognition they should. They won’t show up on the report card, you won’t see them in front of the school at kindergarten screening, but now you know who is really anchoring down that boat, when it all gets real.