Mortgaging The Future

School kids today struggle with a lot outside the classroom. Their distractions range from drugs and cyberbullying to over-busy schedules and ads peddling unrealistic body images.

The recession has not helped with this. In fact, it’s created more serious distractions, especially for Latinos and African Americans.

A new report put out this week by the National Council of La Raza (NCLR) states [2] that an estimated 1.3 million Latino families will lose their homes to foreclosure between 2009 and 2012. This comes on top of a November report [3] stating that blacks and Latinos are at a disproportionate risk of foreclosure because they have higher-cost loans and face higher unemployment rates.

The NCLR report spells out what this crisis has meant so far for school kids and their parents—and the teachers who deal with them.

• Parents and children alike faced depression and anxiety along with feelings of guilt and resentment.
• More than half of families reported that their children had academic or behavioral problems.
• Families often skimped on medical care to save money.
• They also had few or no financial reserves to deal with future problems.

This is not the first time this blog has pointed out the impact of economic calamity on school kids [4]. Chances are it won’t be the last. That’s because the financial crisis has been allowed to steamroll poor and middle class families with very little being done. In this case, banks have made almost no effort to offer homeowners forbearance or workable loan changes. And U.S. banking officials have done next to nothing (visible at least) to pressure the banks.

In good times, it’s easy to shrug and say “The poor are always with us.” But this problem is growing. Many teachers are already well acquainted with its fallout (thanks in part to Teaching Tolerance resources like this) [5]. Many others are about to join them. Sadly, that’s something you can take to the bank.