It Took 18 Suicides to Get This School System to Open Back Up

February 2nd, 2021

Awake Goy

The nation’s fifth-largest school district, in Clark County, Nevada, is opening back up after 18 students committed suicide during the pandemic shutdown.

Administrators of the system, of which Las Vegas is a part, said they’d also had another “3,100 alerts of suicide risks or students in need of support through the district’s mental health monitoring system.”

Students deemed high-risk will first be evaluated and invited back to in-person learning based on their academic and social-emotional needs, Bakersfield Now reported. The New York Times also did a story on the deaths. “When we started to see the uptick in children taking their lives, we knew it wasn’t just the COVID numbers we need to look at anymore,” Clark County Superintendent Jesus Jara told The Times.

A surge in youth suicides has been seen across the U.S. Some schools, like those in Las Vegas, have been closed more than a year.

SOURCES:

Bakersfield Now January 26, 2021

The New York Times January 24, 2021

Image by Ernesto Eslava from Pixabay