Faith Challenges: It Ain't All Comfort

Whom does education serve? It serves much more than individual students. It is a foundation for lives that comprise a community. Education gives employers a workforce to hire. Education raises the level of general skills, as well as abilities to learn and think. That makes better workers, innovators, problem-solvers, and entrepreneurs. Giving children a good, safe base from which to learn is a boon for an entire society, not just the individual children in the system. It makes for a population who can read, understand instructions, learn new skills, and navigate a world of new technologies and innovations. Trauma, however, changes how a child moves into and through an educational setting. We talk about trauma from things like death, illness, job loss, relocation, poverty, school shootings, and the like. We rarely address the trauma associated with violent immigration policies. How do you listen to your teacher, when you are worried about where you will sleep? ...