What We're Reading | Week of November 7, 2022
Timely reads from the MCC team about youth mental health, selective college admissions, and the analog memes of childhood.
Newsweek | The Story We're Telling About Youth Mental Health is Hurting Our Kids
In this Newsweek op-ed, our friends at FrameWorks Institute explain one barrier to supporting teens’ mental health: that we’re often hearing a “crisis story” about it – which they argue directs our attention to dealing with problems that are already happening.
Instead, they say, youth mental health needs to be proactively built rather than retroactively repaired. And they’ve outlined four specific ways we can change that narrative and better support our students.
The New York Times | This Group Has $100 Million and a Big Goal: To Fix America
This piece by Farah Stockman highlights the groundbreaking work of our friends at New Pluralists to bridge divides and fix what’s broken in American democracy. We love to see bold thinking paired with resources to create change!
The Atlantic | Why Did We All Have the Same Childhood?
If you’ve ever sung “Jingle bells, Batman smells,” you know what childlore is even without a definition. These are the games, rhymes, trends, and legends that shape childhood—”analog memes” shared across time and space. Julie Beck explores the roots of childlore in this fun and nostalgic piece in The Atlantic.
Best Colleges | Why Won’t Elite Colleges Increase Enrollment?
Do elite colleges have a moral obligation to take more students? Rick and Jake Weissbourd weigh in in this piece from Best Colleges that cites MCC’s white paper on the topic.
Increasing acceptance rates at elite colleges will make them more equitable and allow more options for students. If your kids are currently in the application process, or plan to be in the next few years, you’re going to want to read this one!
