Education IS Powerful

 

Look, there is a reason that in the days following a tumultuous election a host of horrible text blasts and threatening messages are being sent to high school and college students and causing parents to consider pulling their children from school. Race, immigration, religion, gender and sexuality are lightning rods in campaign seasons. Sadly, no matter who is in power in this country, private wealth and personal interest have more influence on public affairs than any notion of a common good.

As a nonprofit organization we are bound to remain non-partisan (but not apolitical). We may not endorse or oppose any candidate or political party. But we can unequivocally state that it is our mission and our duty to not just provide for young people who wish to continue their education beyond high school but to protect their right to learn and their safety as they exercise that right.

Starting November 6, 2024, high school and college students across the country began receiving text messages which threaten their bodily autonomy, their safety, and their freedom. The content is so nasty (and scary) that I can not bear to repeat it here, but you can find it online if you need to see it. Sometimes these messages call them by name, and they are delivered specifically to large swaths of students who identify as Black or female. By the time these words are posted, there will likely be new versions, new targets, and ample copycats added to this digital campaign of hate and fear.

The Scholarship Foundation of St. Louis is taking action. As always, we will make sure our students and their families have the information they need to make their own good decisions. Our staff will prepare advisories to students on cyber-safety and on precautionary measures to take if they feel unsafe on campus (and we will share those with the public as well). We will check-in individually and privately on our students’ physical, emotional, and financial well-being.

Education is powerful. This current digital form of widespread abuse is centered on young minds and on students and schools to cultivate anxiety and divert power. Consider this despicable behavior as evidence of the fear some have that critical and visionary thinking may result from learning. Invisible perpetrators apparently believe that a few sentences on a screen might drive students away from school and from their rightful place in democracy itself.

Everything about the history and the current mission of The Scholarship Foundation calls us to counteract this campaign of invisible attack with even deeper commitment to opportunity, safety, and support of students, especially those not born into wealth.

I was a child in the 1960s, younger than those now receiving these terrifying text messages. I knew “We Shall Overcome” as a quaint folk song, but nowadays the verse I belt out loudest is “We are Not Afraid”. Please join me, not just in singing but in commitment to counteract fear with steadfast support of educational opportunity.

And if you’d like to discuss HOW to do so, please call (314-799-3547) or email me at faith@sfstl.org and I’ll be happy to talk with you.

– Faith Sandler