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Thursday, February 25, 2021

Reporter's notebook:

Wilkine Brutus 
(Courtesy of Meghan McCarthy)
Ahmaud Arbery in February. Breonna Taylor in March. George Floyd in May. On the same day a white police officer killed Floyd in Minneapolis, a white woman called the cops on a Black bird watcher in New York City's Central Park.

This onslaught of national news coverage about the killings and harassment of Black people at the hands of police and bad-faith vigilantes helped spark the largest uprising in U.S history. An international reckoning with racial injustice during a pandemic launched peaceful protests and strengthened cross-racial alliances. It also led to instances of riots and police violence against protesters and journalists. 

All of this came at an emotional cost.

In the streets of West Palm Beach, I heard fatigue seeping out of the bullhorns. I heard young people debating legislative policy on every corner. College students. Professionals and working-class folks. I saw masks sliding down people’s faces in 80-degree weather. Tears. Confusion. Anger. Sadness.

I caught my own mask just before changing my camera lens. I look just like those kids, with their dreadlocks, tattoos and energy. I still haven’t measured how much the images of the protests and the headlines about dead Black bodies have impacted me. Compartmentalizing my emotions is part of my tool box — as a reporter and as a Black man in America. 
As a symbolic protest on June 1, a Black man knelt on the neck of a fellow white male protestor, whose unresponsive body and face lay flat on the hot road between Okeechobee Boulevard and Rosemary Avenue in West Palm Beach. (Wilkine Brutus/WLRN)
A lot of Black college students went through all of that while juggling school life. In my reporting for Class of COVID-19, I found that many Black students are feeling lost. Defeated, even. 

But there are also silver linings. After enduring isolation and unspeakable exhaustion, many Black students are embracing the conversation surrounding mental health. They're finding more productive ways to cope. 

"Trying to internalize things never works, and it never helps," Xavier McClinton, the student body president at Florida A&M University in Tallahassee, told me. The mainstream culture that has long invalidated the mental health needs of Black people is shifting.

It's easy to feel frustrated that the anger over dead Black bodies seems to have lessened, that the visibility of the movement for racial justice has faded. But I feel hopeful, instead, that the events of 2020 have sparked another important movement: for self-care and self-preservation.

Wilkine Brutus, WLRN Palm Beach County reporter
Jason-Anthony Prendergast is the counseling director at Florida Memorial University in Miami Gardens. He is the only full-time counselor on the historically Black university’s campus. (Daniel Rivero/WLRN)

Read and listen:

Black Students At HBCUs Embrace Therapy Amid Pandemic And Racial Injustice
Students at historically Black colleges and universities in Florida are finding different ways to cope with enduring illness, grief, family obligations and uncertainty. For the multiethnic Black community, COVID-19 has been an added stressor atop another centuries-long pandemic: racial injustice. Read and listen here.
Know anyone who would be interested in this newsletter? Please share this link and ask them to subscribe. Read past issues here.
Watch live: Class of COVID-19 is premiering this week on public television stations around the state. For a full listing of air dates and times, or to watch it online, visit classofcovid.org and click “watch.”

On the topic: Black mental health and higher education

  • About 56% of Black college students who receive counseling at their school health centers reported that the pandemic has had a detrimental impact on their mental health, according to a recent study from the Center for Collegiate Mental Health. Also, 13% said they had lost someone to COVID-19. (Inside Higher Ed)
  • Writing, listening to music and doing yoga are some of the coping mechanisms recommended by mental health experts during a recent webinar for Black students at Syracuse University. (The Daily Orange)
  • Mental health was one of three top issues college students around the country say they want their school administrations to pay more attention to, according to a recent survey. (Inside Higher Ed)
  • In order to meet the mental health needs of Black students, the University of Southern California hired 50 new counselors, more than half of whom are people of color. Counselors were also embedded within the school's Center for Black Cultural and Student Affairs, in hopes of increasing access to mental health care. (USC)
  • "We’ve made a lot of progress in the last 10 years when it comes to talking about mental health," Dr. David Satcher told the Baltimore Sun. Satcher, who is Black, is a former U.S. Surgeon General and a former director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He said if these conversations continue, the U.S. will eventually improve diagnosis and treatment of mental illness among Black people. (Baltimore Sun)

In the news: Class of COVID-19 continues with ongoing coverage from Florida Public Media.

  • Before COVID-19, schools in the Florida Keys sent home forms for families to fill out indicating they were struggling to buy enough food. The schools "didn't get as much response as they expected," WLRN's Florida Keys reporter Nancy Klingener told Sundial. "Now … they just set up carts with bags of food. And when school lets out, the kids just grab a bag on their way to the bus." More here.

Up next:

Students who have been learning remotely for the last year stand to lose up to 9% of their potential income over the course of their lives, national economists warn. And studies have shown kids who already face the biggest obstacles to success are more likely to be taking classes online instead of in person. In our next newsletter, on Monday, March 1, we'll explore how the pandemic has exacerbated existing inequities in education.

Funding for Class of COVID-19 was provided in part by the Hammer Family Charitable Foundation and the Education Writers Association.
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