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By Annie Ma The Associated Press COLUMBUS, Ohio

They open up to her about their dating lives. About pregnancy scares. About their fights with their parents, about the trauma they experience outside school. She keeps a mental

But at predominantly Black schools like the one in Columbus, Ohio, where Ms. Strother works, students’ mental health is further tested by pressures and discrimination they endure because they are Black, as well as poverty and violence in some communities that have faced years of disinvestment.

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“Anytime you deal with African-American mental health, you’re not dealing with one thing,” Ms. Strother said. “It is several things. It is trauma that has not been addressed.”

The drivers of the mental health crisis for Black children begin early and persist through a lifetime. Black children’s first encounters with racism can start before they are even in school, and Black teenagers report experiencing an average of five instances of racial discrimination per day. Young Black

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Kelly Johnson-Crowder, and daughter, Daisy Johnson, and great grandson, Kendall Scott were on hand for the street renaming.

“My grandmother ws a very, very humble person and to see this being done in her honor means everything to me,” said Mrs. Johnson-Crowder. “She was one who always opened her doors to everyone. She always

Bonnie Newman Davis/Richmond Free Press

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