The COVID-19 pandemic, while devastating, presents the St. Louis region with an opportunity to obtain an understanding of the comprehensive nature of schools within impoverished black neighborhoods.
Under ideal (and affluent) circumstances, schools are institutions centered around reading, writing and arithmetic whose existence has no bearing on the bellies of their students.
Yet in poor neighborhoods, schools provide other vital services, such as consistent, warm meals for students who may not have food in their homes; consistent, warm shelter during the winter months for students whose families may not be able to afford to pay to heat their homes; consistent electricity for students who may not be privy to such privileges at home; and consistent and easy access to caring adults.
Knowing the dire financial state of the families of many of its students, how then can SLPS continue to justify closing schools throughout black neighborhoods? I applaud the organizations and individuals who have stepped up to assuage the hunger of children who, in absence of school attendance, would literally miss meals, yet we must remember that such outreach is only intended to be temporary. Shuttering schools in low-income areas not only impacts education, but it snatches much-needed services from the surroundings and sustenance from the stomachs of poor black kids.
COVID-19 has unmasked the unsanitized truth of how quickly SLPS students can be met with hunger. Have we become immune to their cries?
Arthurine Harris
St. Louis
