In honor of National Mentoring Month, We’Ced sat down with former youth reporter and current mentor Victor Seguin to get his take on what it means to help guide and support young people. Read More
We wake up really early — 5 a.m. — which is hard for me since I’m used to sleeping in. I put on lots of layers — a long-sleeved sweater, a hat, boots, and a handkerchief. It gets hot, but we need to wear it all in order to protect ourselves from sunburn later in the day. We have to bring our own food and water. In the mornings, mom packs lunch for both us (usually sandwiches and beans) and then we head out together.
A couple of weeks ago, Iris Vang, 17, a youth leader with Faith in Merced's Leadership Academy, had the opportunity to attend the 2017 Sisterhood Rising Camp in Portola, Calif. Spending a week in nature connecting with her cultural and ancestral roots inspired her to write about her experience as a young Hmong-American woman. Her poem ‘My Body’ is full of vivid imagery and is an ode to her culture.
By Alexander Salas
Photos by Crystal Rivera and Alyssa Castro
MERCED, Calif. — Last Saturday one of Merced’s local community youth groups, Faith in Merced (FIM), had a major event to showcase a mural they advocated for earlier this year. Read More
According to the 2016 Merced County Community Health Assessment, Hispanic and Latino residents reported higher rates of chronic depressive symptoms than White counterparts, despite having lower diagnosis rates. The community’s youth are also vulnerable, with more than 34 percent of Latino teens in Merced County reporting depression-related feelings almost every day for two weeks or more, according to KidsData.
Too often, Guillen said, Latino and immigrant families get used to operating under stressful conditions and fail to recognize the signs of more serious mental health disorders like depression, anxiety or even Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
The event was a joint effort by BHC and partner groups like Cultiva La Salud, Healthy Equity Project and the Parent Institute for Quality Education (PIQE) that provided dozens of MCSD parents with a chance to air concerns over the district’s spending. In total, more than two-dozen families were in attendance, speaking four different languages and representing a wide swath of the community concerned over the lack of transparency in the district’s Local Control Accountability Plan (LCAP).
The LCAP is a statewide requirement for school districts that must show how each agency plans to spend money provided through the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF). Like many districts, MCSD relies on LCFF dollars for a majority of its budget and the state funds accounted for 75 percent of the district’s $134 million 2016-2017 budget. About $21 million of those LCFF funds are considered equity-based and intended specifically for high-need populations like foster youth, low-income students and English Learners.
This recent spike builds upon an older trend of Merced’s youth reporting higher-than-average rates of depression or hopelessness. According to 2011-2013 data from online research tool Kidsdata, minority teens in Merced County report feelings of depression at higher rates than statewide peer groups. The numbers are based on responses from 7th, 9th and 11th grade students who reported feeling sad or hopeless almost every day for two weeks or more.
If you have never experienced addiction, it can be hard to understand what people really go through. It is easy to blame addicts, but no one wakes up one day wanting to be addicted. They face battles everyday. And so to those around them.
A study from 2010 shows that over 23.5 million Americans are addicted to drugs and alcohol. But only 1 in 10 Americans receives the treatment they need. And as of 2014, there were only around 14,000 treatment centers nationwide, not enough compared to the size of the problem.
Because of his circumstance, it was impossible for him to ‘pick himself up by the bootstraps’ and be ‘successful.’
But despite his incarceration, he has always been there for me, even if we only see each other through a window or speak on the phone during visits. This tall, quiet, soft spoken, funny man is the person I most admire. His piercing blue eyes that reflect the sadness in his soul from all the trauma he endured.
My dad is my role model because he holds on to hope that we will be reunited one day. Because he is determined to love me when he was never loved. And because, even though he has been through so much, he is willing to help others.
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