Recession uproots, takes toll on kids

By ANNE WALLACE ALLEN

Like the Great Depression, this economic downturn is wrenching lives out of shape.

But unlike 90 years ago, hunger isn’t the main problem, and neither is the kind of homelessness that sent thousands of middle-class Americans into tent cities during the Depression. This time the toll is far less obvious: Children are grappling with more stress at home, and low-income families, already highly mobile, are being forced to pull up stakes and move more often.

“It’s huge,” said Ana Leon, the school counselor at Wilton Manors Elementary in Fort Lauderdale, who said mobility had increased significantly this year at her 600-student, mostly low-income school.

Many Wilton Manors students are migrants whose families are returning to live in Central and South America because there’s no work. Others are construction workers leaving Florida’s collapsed housing market to look for jobs in Texas.

Educators and demographers say frequent moves can lower school performance and increase chances that students will drop out of school. It also makes it more difficult to provide appropriate resources to children who have learning disabilities and behavioral issues.

“Mobility is one of the main things that hinders student achievement,” said Leon. She cited the case of a young girl in elementary school who moved from another city just one week before standardized testing began.

“She was lost,” said Leon. “We have her in a group, we’re doing one-on-one counseling with her, and we’re talking to the teacher so the teacher can support the parent.”

Other students leave without any warning — the families just disappear one day, said Leon, adding that in those cases it’s impossible to help the children prepare for the move and assure a smooth transition to another school.

This economic downturn is not nearly as severe as the one that hit in the 1920s. Then, unemployment reached 25 percent; now it’s around 8 percent, and the government helps with food, clothing and housing.

“The kids have clothes. They can get breakfast and lunch at school,” said Julie Hartline, a school counselor in Smyrna, Georgia. “It’s just a change in lifestyle with a lot of kids. That’s a big deal, even for adults, but especially when you’re young and just developing.”

Groups that study family mobility, such as the Internal Revenue Service and the U.S. Census Bureau, do not yet have hard data from the period when the general downturn in economic growth became widespread in September 2008.

Without that, it’s hard to say with certainty if mobility has risen, said Scott South, a demographer in the sociology department at the State University of New York in Albany.

Families usually move less during poor economic conditions, he said. However, in very severe situations, families will be forced to move because of foreclosures and evictions.

For now, the trend is being seen predominantly through the eyes of educators.

“We keep hearing from principals that kids are moving more,” said Gerald Tirozzi, the executive director of the National Association of Secondary School Principals.

Despite all the bad news, many children said they’ve hardly noticed the recession. Others said it’s affecting their parents, but not them.

“When I think about it, I’m actually pretty lucky because of all the stuff I do have,” Dillon said.

Educators are cautioning parents to be careful about discussing personal financial or job-related struggles with younger children.

For older children, Hartline recommended being as honest as possible about what is going on with family finances.