THREAD
#Philly is the poorest big city in America where nearly a third of residents live at or below the #poverty level. Nearly 70% of Philly is BIPOC. I live in one of the poorest zip codes in a 95% Black neighborhood. There are two public elementary schools nearby.
1/x

There is also a Black Muslim K-5 charter school, a Catholic K-8 parochial school and a pre-school at the AME church behind my house. Every day during the school year was punctuated with the sounds of kids yelling, laughing, playing. It has been silent since March. No kids.
2/x

For a decade before I was paralyzed, I ran a mentoring group at one school for middle grade students, focusing on reading and writing. Until they were in my group, not one kid had personally owned a book. All those kids have been in homes without books since March.
3/x

The school term began day after Labor Day, online, in a city with a huge broadband gap. My next door neighbors have three K-8 kids.They most certainly do not have three laptops. How are these kids being taught in three different classes? How are poor kids learning right now?
4/x

My mentoring group highlighted the huge learning chasm for kids in my neighborhood. Kids DESPERATE for knowledge, aching to read stories about THEM & write their own little stories. Just thinking about this brings tears--what is being done to help our poorest kids right now?
5/x

We are, of course, fixated on the 202k Americans dead from #COVID19. But Trump's anti-science refusal to stop the #pandemic in January, before there were deaths, has had many more casualties. My neighborhood's school kids are at the top of any list.
6/x

My wife, a college professor at a local university, has been teaching online since March. Her students are freshmen, missing the dynamism of transitioning into adulthood via campus life. Missing the interaction with fellow students. This is a huge loss for 18yr olds.
7/x

We can--and must--continue to focus on #COVID19 deaths. But there's a lot more we must address. These kids are a casualty not even on the national radar. The learning gap is getting wider every day for some kids. I know first hand what that looks like. We must fix this.
8/x

Voting won't fix everything. But one thing it WILL fix is removing an anti-science ideologue who doesn't care about kids--not even his own teenged son and 10 grandchildren. #BidenHarris are focused on science and controlling the pandemic. The #vote is crucial for our kids.
9/x

The only way to recover what these kids have lost is by having leadership that acknowledges these kids' existence & understands how broad the needs are for ALL our kids. And will act in those kids' interests so they can start to reclaim their lives.
10/10 http://vote.org