Prison-like Schools in South LA Make Kids Depressed

Photo by Steven Fernandez via Flickr

The results of a recent survey administered in seven public schools in South Los Angeles are downright depressing. Students feel scared, unmotivated, unsupported, and ignored, and it's causing many to experience the symptoms of clinical depression. Administrators and psychologists agree, noting that the multiple killings of youth in the community leaves a pall on the students, and that their choice to skip school because they are "tired, had trouble sleeping, felt helpless or hopeless, were bored or felt lazy" is to be expected. With schools a reflection of a depressive environment, it's no wonder their students are sad.

6,008 students were surveyed in schools that "are among the lowest performing in the Los Angeles Unified School District and are in an area where dissatisfaction with the traditional public school system is driving many students into charter schools," reports the LA Times. Kids attested to feeling like the system was failing them, and that they lacked real choices for college-prep curriculum. The results indicate that "many students in some of the city's poorest, most violent neighborhoods believe their schools set the bar for success too low -- and then shove students beneath it."