Research has shown that schoolchildren exposed to neighborhood violence can have a tougher time learning, as they experience more stress and depression than their peers growing up in safe neighborhoods. A Johns Hopkins University sociologist discovered that the consequences of neighborhood violence reach further than previously known, even spilling over to students who come from safe neighborhoods, the Washington Post reports. Using data from Chicago, Julia Burdick-Will linked exposure to neighborhood violence to a drop in test scores, an effect that extended to students coming from communities that experienced little or no violence. “The individual effects may really be the tip of the iceberg. . . . We could potentially see this effect in schools for more than just the kid who lived around the corner from a homicide,” said Burdick-Will, who studies urban schools. Her findings were published in the journal Sociology of Education. “You can detect what seems to be the effect of . . . a classmate’s exposure to violence on everyone in the classroom.”
Schools are recognizing trauma as a factor that may be derailing learning, with more districts training educators on how to teach students who may be grappling with traumatizing events. Alex King, a 17-year-old anti-violence activist in Chicago, has grown up surrounded by gun violence. His nephew was fatally shot the day after school let out one year. King helped organize the End of the School Year Peace March and Rally in Chicago last month with survivors of the Parkland, Fl., school shooting, and he found out that night that a friend had been killed. “I’ve been shot at multiple times. I’ve lost family and friends to violence,” King said. “It kind of, like, became a part of life, violence. It’s like something that you can’t escape.”