The municipality confirms the serious impact of the pandemic on children and adolescents

It is said by various people who work close to childhood and adolescence. The protector of children in the province, Amelia Lopez, also told El Diario. Now local government officials confirm it: the pandemic and isolation have seriously affected society, but especially the youngest and young people.

“In the post-pandemic period, there is widespread dissatisfaction, a lack of motivation among young people, boys, girls and adolescents, according to Unicef ​​research. It is a mental problem that can lead to depression or violence. This is a requirement and a situation that the state at all levels will have to take into account,” said Celeste Curetti, municipal secretary for social inclusion and territories, in an interview with El Diario.

“In addition to the economic problems it has left in its wake, the pandemic has created a number of mental health issues that relate to community life,” the official noted.

Rafael Sacheto, secretary of education, culture and promotion of science in the local government, believes that the pandemic has “damaged” education. He assured that the Municipality is aimed at restoring “the habit of going to school, the habit of studying, and we are dealing with complex situations”.

“In primary school, there are children in the second cycle who have not acquired the skills of reading and writing, comprehension, basic mathematical operations and there is special accompaniment,” he reasoned.

Long “teaching breaks”

As is known, education is under the province’s competence and jurisdiction. However, the municipality works in different aspects.

Sachetto mentioned that of particular interest is “doing things that try to reduce dropout rates on an annualized basis.”

He mentioned three tools: school support for primary and secondary; the psychopedagogical office, which deals with behavioral and cognitive problems; and interdisciplinary mobile teams, with a territorial approach, in school and with families. “Especially in secondary school, pedagogical breaks are found, especially at a higher age. It’s not that they are leaving, but that there are big absences,” he explained to this newspaper.

He assessed that the work of the local teams “helps a lot”. “We don’t reach everybody,” he admitted, “but it’s an action that prevents a lot of desertions that might have occurred if we didn’t have these three devices.” He pointed out that in a city with public universities, young people should have the opportunity to reach this level or have non-formal education.

“We have achieved very good rates of continuity of the school trajectory, but we have several cases of these breaks that we follow, we go to visit families,” he assured.

He also said that he is in constant contact with the inspectors. He said they had “requests, concerns” about harassment cases (another serious post-pandemic expression) and that they had “dealt with every one of them.”

“Lack of opportunities in our young people”

For our part, Curetti and I started by talking about the acts of vandalism that happened weeks ago in urban groups, especially in the Botta neighborhood.

“It also has to do with the lack of opportunities for our young people, which is happening both nationally and globally,” he explained. He explained that they work with various districts of the state and with the provincial Ministry of Education.

In this context, the official said that “desertion after the pandemic is very high, especially among young people and adolescents” and confirmed that they are working “to be able to bring them back into the system so that they have opportunities in the future”. He spoke of “generalized dissatisfaction, demotivation”. “The pandemic has left a number of mental health issues in its wake. These are requests we have,” he confirmed. The head of Social Inclusion and Territories revealed this morning that the municipality had to “provide resources to provide professional psychological and psychiatric services primarily for boys and girls”. “This is not a service that suits us,” he clarified, but contextualized that “Pastor is not enough and we have to think about whether we can cover this need.”

New railway crossing, on the occasion of the third anniversary of the municipal museum

Tomorrow you can enjoy a new level crossing that will repeat the route of the French railway. It will start from the French railway station, where Pereira and Domínguez Park is today, and then continue to Arroyo Algodon, La Playosa and Pozo del Molle. Those wishing to participate must register in advance by sending the registration form to the email of the Municipal Railway Museum: museoferroviariovm@gmail.com.