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preeminent scholar and hisknowledge, and as we all know, torian personifies her place in knowledge is power,” said Joseph. the pantheon of the civil rights Justina Schlund, senior director struggle. That she was in this of Content and Field Learning at place at this time was consisCollaborative for Academic, Social, tent with her pedigree as the and Emotional Learning (CASEL) daughter of Esther Georgia in Chicago, said that emotional and Irving Cooper, a president of mental wellness heavily influences the NAACP’s Arlington branch. students’ ability to learn and their Her first lessons in activism healthy development, and throughout the pandemic there was a disproportionate impact on children of color.
Dr. Michael Lindsey, the dean and Paulette Goddard professor of Social Work at NYU Silver School of Social Work, studies child and adolescent mental health. He also helped create the report “Ring the Alarm: The Crisis of Black Youth Suicide in America.”
Lindsey said that the COVID19 crisis in high poverty-impacted communities has led to “enduring struggles,” such as loss of life, disruption of quality of life, job displacement, and a disconnection of kids and adolescents from schools. Even though it’s two years removed from the initial pandemic, students are still adjusting or falling behind engendering a battle with depression, anxiety, and trauma, he said. In the AAKOMA study, depression was most severe among Native American, Latino/Hispanic, and Black youth while anxiety was highest among Latino/Hispanic youth. The symptoms of depression most often presented as kids “being tired and having low energy.”
“When you think about how our young people of color, that fatigue that you’re seeing that’s showing up in class––they’re putting their head on the desk and slumping down in chairs––that’s not necessarily seen as a child with depression,” said Breland-Noble. “That might be perceived as a child who’s lazy and disinterested.”
For anxiety, a feeling of being wor-
ried or nervous was universal, but each group showed slightly different signs as well. Black youth were more likely to struggle with decision-making and worry about bad things happening as a result of anxiety, while Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI) and Native American youth tended to be avoidant of worrying situations, said the study. Lindsey posits that a contributing factor to the rising rates of youth of color is a tendency towards pun32 • May 26, 2022 - June 1, 2022 ishment of certain behaviors rather than mental health and behavioral support for kids. The school environment has to understand the nuanced presentations for kids that would warrant them a connection to mental health treatment, he said. “There was a Black kid that I worked with who was very depressed,” said Lindsey. “He said ‘when I’m sad or depressed, I feel like knocking someone’s head off so they can feel how I feel.’ And so if that kid goes and does that, he’s going to be pushed out. Suspended, expelled from school. Not saying it didn’t warrant that, but did anyone along the way ask him what he was sad about and can we address that.” Breland-Noble agreed that access to care is pivotal and that technological features of the 988 Lifeline, like texting, would benefit young people. But, a service lifeline necessitates cultural competency, especially with youth experiencing racial traumas or the impacts of systemic racism. “In some communities of color there’s a healthy fear that if the police are dispatched to deal with a mental health crisis, that could have a devastatingly negative impact,” said BrelandNoble. Lindsey fully supports the “promise” of the 988 Lifeline for providing a different type of response to mental health crises rather than relying on police. He criticized the U.S. for chronically underfunding mental health services and hopes that access will increase.
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occurred at such meetings listening to her mother and other members of the movement. After attending segregated schools, she enrolled at Oberlin College and later earned a master’s degree in sociology from Fisk University in 1940. Her thesis “The Negro Woman Domestic Work in Relation to Trade Unionism” was indicative of her political tendency and it was honored with a Rosenwald Fellowship for her subsequent
study of African American youth toward World War II. She was well on her way to becoming a prominent professor, but it was hard to dismiss her activist inclinations and she was soon a member of the Southern Negro Youth Congress. Her political prowess and instincts were quickly recognized. She was assigned to the Voting Project in Birmingham, Alabama, and it was there that fate would introduce her to THE NEW YORK AMSTERDAM NEWS
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James Jackson, her future husband. He was involved in fighting for the rights of tobacco workers and for the next seven years they committed themselves to ending Jim Crow laws while giving the SNYC a presence across the South. She worked alongside Jackson as he continued his labor struggles and his rise in the ranks of the Communist Party. They were viewed as the ideal activist couple, equally devoted to
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each other and the movement.
After her husband fulfilled his military obligation during World War II, Esther continued to work as a political organizer, mainly in the SNYC where she began mentoring young African American writers and artists. A portion of those years can be found in their association with Louis and Dorothy Burnham, another remarkable duo the Jacksons met during their days in the SNYC. Esther, in the pages of the “Reader,” commented on the final days of the organization. “I think the SNYC would have continued in the South, despite the racism and segregation, if the national terror of McCarthyism had not been unleashed,” she wrote. “But even though we had a very broad base—politicians, ministers, teachers, and others in the community—support for the organizations waned. This left a void, which ‘Freedomways’ was all too eager and prepared to fill.”
And the publication not only filled this void but opened a spigot for an impressive retinue of writers from Du Bois, Robeson, Dr.
King, Shirley Graham Du
Bois, Jack O’Dell, Dr. John
Henrik Clarke, Ernest Kaiser,
Audre Lorde, June Jordan, and a host of African dignitaries, et al. “Contributors to Freedomways,” wrote
Julian Bond in the foreword to the “Reader,” “were distinguished by the high level of discourse they brought to their written work and also by their militant activism—these were writers with picket signs as well as with pens in hand, scholars whose classrooms were union halls, students who took instruction in the cotton fields or lunch counters, artists who brushed consciences as well as canvasses.”
But it was Esther who supplied the final touch, who made sure the writing resonated with the inAriama C. Long is a Report tended conviction and was for America corps member and consistent with the over-writes about culture and poliall vision of the publica-tics in New York City for The Amtion. She will be missed. Her sterdam News. Your donation to husband died in 2007 at match our RFA grant helps keep age 92. Their papers are her writing stories like this one; available at the NYU Taplease consider making a taxmiment Library. They had deductible gift of any amount two daughters, Kathryn today by clicking here: bit.ly/ and Harriet. amnews1
