PUBLISHER'S NOTEBOOK:Time to come together for the good of our students

In my hometown of Delta, Colorado and at my high school alma mater Delta High, tragedy has struck twice within weeks. Two young men on separate occasions made the unimaginable decision of taking their own lives. In the community there has been an outpouring of empathy and support for the students and faculty left to deal with the loss of their classmates and students. Neighboring school districts have sent cards, flowers, balloons and notes of support. Community churches are having prayer services and parents are reaching out through social media to let students know they are not alone and their doors are always open.

In a high school of roughly 600 students a suicide can shake a school’s foundation to its core. Two in less than a month has to make us all look introspectively for answers to questions like, are we doing enough as a society to help students in their day-to-day lives? Are faculties trained well enough to recognize the signs of mental despair that leads to such a final and devastating act? Do we as an adult community consider suicide awareness to be part of a child’s education? Do we have the responsibility as a community to make sure that our school districts have the funding to provide such services for our children?

And if we believe that behavioral health is just confined to teenage suicide, we need to think again.

I have two grandsons who are 11 months apart. Landon is the oldest at 11 and Joey is 10. Landon and Joey’s father struggled with drug addiction. It’s something they have dealt with their whole lives. My daughter was able to recognize the addiction early and when it was clear that their father wasn’t going to get better she made the difficult decision to leave with the boys. For years she raised the boys on her own never knowing when the boys’ father would be sober enough to co-parent. But through the eyes of the boys, he was their father and they admired him. When the boys were 8 and 9 their father went back into rehab. This had been an ongoing pattern. And again, the boys would not be able to see their father. Joey came home one day after school and handed his mother a business card.

“What is this?” she asked.

“I need to be able to talk to her and I need you to meet with her. You have to sign some paperwork for me,” Joey told her.

The business card was from the school psychologist.

“Why do you feel the need to talk to her?” his mother asked. “Because I am angry all the time. I’m angry at my Dad.”

My daughter, Victoria, set up the appointment and Joey has been in therapy ever since and his brother followed suit.

Tragically, last summer, their father passed away from complications due to an asthma attack. This left the boys with more questions than answers.

Thankfully during these difficult times for the boys this service was available. Often when we discuss funding for education we focus on administration overhead, classroom size and test scores. We fail to discuss a healthy environment for our children and the challenges they face just in everyday life. And when tragedy does strike, we throw around blame, mostly at bullies. While it’s true that kids can be incredibly cruel, let’s not forget that depression can be a part of person’s life from a very young age. Do we, as a society, wash our hands of it and say it’s all the parents’ problem — that it’s all survival of the fittest — or are we willing to pony up and help provide the necessary services to help all students?

As a community we fought hard for the certificate of need for 36 behavioral health beds at Mat-Su Regional Medical Center. Those 36 beds are going to fill up quickly. Are we willing to invest in a grassroots effort to provide services to our children who are struggling with understanding why their life is filled with upheaval? And be there for them when they are at the breaking point mentally because of mental, physical or substance abuse in their home or because of the stress we place on them to succeed academically or athletically?

Joey and Landon are leading healthy and happy lives because they have a mother who loves them and the man who has come into their lives loves them as if they were his own. But they’re also in a better place because when they needed professional help it was there for them.

School district budgets are being formulated and discussed for next year. I’m sure they will fall short on revenue to cover their needs.

Last year I witnessed at the Mat-Su Borough meeting an embarrassing display of finger-pointing at the Mat-Su Borough School representatives during the public input concerning a proposed 3 percent sales tax. It was a tax that I publicly opposed in a column because of the current state of the economy we are facing, and the negative effect such a tax would have on retailers. The economy hasn’t improved much since, but nevertheless it is time for us to come together and come to a solution for funding the needs of our school district, whether that means finding a new revenue source or implementing an independent audit of the school districts spending and recommendations for expense savings. Something has to give. We can’t continue pointing fingers from a safe distance demanding a solution. And we can’t wait for tragedy to hit and send flowers.

Everything has to be on the table.