Erika Bocknek, associate professor of educational psychology at Wayne State University, wrote an article for The Conversation about sleep routines. Everyone knows that sleep is critical for growing children and their mental and physical health. Regular, high-quality sleep habits help children consolidate memory and learn better. A lack of sleep contributes to childhood depression, anxiety and even risk of suicide, along with physical health problems, including risk of injury. The challenge is making sure kids log those valuable zzz’s. She writes that there are three main components of high-quality sleep for children. First, they need enough total hours – sleep duration. Sleep quality is important, too – sleeping soundly during the night with few disruptions or awakenings. And, finally, there’s sleep timing – essentially, a consistent schedule, with bedtime and risetime about the same across the whole week.

By Betty Gold and Juno DeMelo  The new year is a great time for a health reset. But when we set the bar too high, we inevitably blow it, blame ourselves, and go back to the status quo. You're supposed to get two and a half hours of moderate-intensity physical activity each week, or about 30 minutes five days a week.9 But don't let those numbers intimidate you out of doing what you can. Experts say you can break down the time into 10-minute sessions without missing out on exercise's physical and mental benefits. And research backs up the power of short workouts: One study found that 13 minutes of weight training three times a week is enough to build strength, while another showed that just five minutes a day of running is all it takes to reduce your risk of death from cardiovascular disease. "Some studies suggest that merely standing is good for metabolic health," says Tamara Hew-Butler, PhD, an associate professor of exercise and sports science at Wayne State University in Detroit. "The bottom line is that any exercise is better than none at all."

Deaf people say they sometimes feel like they’re leaving on a different planet from those who hear, but when both learn to use American Sign Language, it can open up a new world of communication. In Detroit, Wayne State University is taking notice. The school’s College of Education recently included a Deaf Studies minor in its curriculum, and the classes are filling up. As the program grows, the school is actively recruiting people who are deaf or hard of hearing as teachers. Kathryn Roberts, interim assistant dean of teacher education at Wayne State, said it would not make sense to teach ASL without instructors from the deaf culture. “It was really important to our division that we had people from the deaf community working with us, because deaf culture is a huge piece of what we wanted to be teaching, Roberts explained. “And education programs, particularly Wayne State’s education program, we have a huge focus on the community.” Roberts added there are an estimated 400,000 deaf people in Michigan, which means the program potentially affects one out of every 20 people in the state. Emily Jo Noschese, assistant professor of bilingual and bicultural education, was one of the first instructors the school recruited. Noschase, who is fourth-generation deaf, not only teaches ASL, but has helped identify and hire five part-time ASL instructors. “Anybody that’s working in a business, somebody who might own a business or a company, they are guaranteed to have a deaf person that might want to come in and work for them,” Noschese said. “They learn sign language; that could benefit the rapport between them and the client, because they will be able to communicate with them.”   

By Sascha Raiyn  Attendance in Michigan schools fell during the 2021-22 academic year. The Detroit Free Press reports the statewide attendance rate has fallen below 90% for the first time in five years, hitting 88% last year. Detroit’s public school system has struggled with attendance throughout the COVID pandemic. DPSCD’s attendance rate for the 2021 school year was around 75%. According to Sarah Lenhoff, a professor of education at Wayne State University, housing insecurity made worse by the pandemic is a major factor in chronic absenteeism. “We’re seeing that revert back to normal and maybe even worse than normal in terms of students experiencing housing instability,” Lenhoff said. “We know that housing instability, homelessness, eviction are just really high correlates to attendance problems.”  

Science has proven that exercising on your period is safe, and it could prove to be very beneficial. However, energy levels may be lower. Tamara Hew-Butler, associate professor of exercise physiology at Wayne State University, explains that women and those who menstruate tend to have lower energy levels during the second half of the menstrual cycle, known as the luteal phase which occurs during days 15 to 28. “The second two weeks – after ovulation, called the luteal phase – are characterized by high levels of progesterone and a smaller rise in estrogen. These high levels of progesterone, followed by a sudden drop in progesterone right before your period, seems to trigger an inflammatory response which precedes the onset of the ‘premenstrual’ symptoms,” Hew-Butler said. “Research suggests that the perception of low energy during the second half of the menstrual cycle mostly results from negative moods like irritability, anger and fatigue which increase the perception of fatigue.”  

By Lori Higgins, Ethan Bakuli and Grace Tucker  The Detroit Public Schools Community District reopened classrooms to students Monday morning for another year of learning amid a pandemic. This will be a critical year for efforts to address enrollment losses, chronic absenteeism, and facilities. The year will also feature a school board election in which a majority of the seats are up for grabs. Wayne State researcher Sarah Lenhoff told Chalkbeat recently that the district’s plans to beef up its attendance teams is a start, but she believes fixing chronic absenteeism will require coordinating with city agencies to address employment, health, transportation, and housing inequalities. “When Detroit’s kids don’t make it to school,” Lenhoff said, “it really speaks to the need for the city to invest more in employment, invest more in stabilized housing, (and) make sure that families have the food and health care that they need, so that they can give their children what they want to give them…to get them in school.”  

By Grace Tucker  Detroit school district officials are planning more aggressive steps to reverse a rise in chronic absenteeism, a huge obstacle to their efforts to help students recover academically from the impact of the pandemic. In the latest school year, 77% of Detroit Public Schools Community District student were chronically absent, meaning they missed at least 10% of school days. Researchers say the figures are further evidence that the district needs to do more to address the broad range of causes for Detroit’s long struggles with absenteeism, including socioeconomic and transportation factors. “I think there’s this impression that Detroit parents don’t care about school, and that could not be further from the truth,” said Sarah Lenhoff, an associate professor at Wayne State University’s College of Education. “Families want their kids to be in school.” Lenhoff co-authored a study analyzing the rise in absenteeism rates during the 2020-21 school year, and said technology was a main contributor, noting that 40% of parents reported that computer problems, like Wi-Fi issues and poor-quality laptops hindered student access to online classrooms. When Detroit’s kids don’t make it to school, Lenhoff said. “it really speaks to the need for the city to invest more in employment, invest in stabilized housing, and make sure that families have the food and health care that they need, so that they can give their children what they want to give them…get them into school.”  

Recovery following the trauma of a school shooting is not uniform – it varies by community, from school to school, across student subgroups and even among individuals. It is also impacted by factors like the availability of school counselors, barriers to accessing mental health support and pre-existing traumas. Family structure, how different communities grieve, and past experiences with gun violence and law enforcement can all inform this process as well. Because of these differences, measures commonly adopted by schools nationwide in response to school shootings — like doubling down on school police or bringing in grief counselors — should be tweaked or reconsidered to fit the needs of Black, Hispanic and immigrant communities, according to school trauma, crisis and security experts. As part of that crisis response, many lawmakers and school leaders have discussed increasing law enforcement and security in schools. However, this option may not be suitable for all students. Black and Hispanic students are already more likely to be in schools with police presence – which is associated with increased school arrests – than their white counterparts. “Schools cause trauma. And not just through school shootings, but in a myriad of ways, especially for historically marginalized and systematically oppressed groups,” said Addison Duane, a former elementary school teacher with a Ph.D. in educational psychology and now a professor at Wayne State University. “And I think that, in the wake of something as horrific and preventable as a school shooting, the trauma compounds.”   

By Naaz Modan In the week following the mass shooting in Uvalde, Texas, multiple school shooting threats have surfaced across the nation, prompting schools to increase security or shut down buildings entirely. Following the COVID-19 pandemic school building reopenings, administrators and staff braced for an increase in student misbehaviors, including aggression and gun violence. While school shootings dropped during building closures, they have returned to pre-pandemic levels and may have even increased, according to Sandy Hook Promise, a nonprofit organization started by the Sand Hook Elementary School parents. Following school shootings, it is common for schools to increase security, including tapping into law enforcement for help. There is also concern, though, that some security measures may actually make students feel unsafe. “There is research to support that the presence of police and school resource officers (SROs) and metal detectors and random locker checks and clear backpacks are directly linked to the psychological trauma response,” said Addison Duane, a former elementary school teacher with a Ph.D. in educational psychology who is now a professor at Wayne State University.

By Rebecca Griesbach and Trish Powell Crain  A federal judge recently ordered R.A. Hubbard high school in Alabama to close its doors – a decision that sparked debate and frustration among many community members. Hubbard will close this summer. Younger students and teachers will be moved out of the majority-Black high school to other schools in Lawrence County. It’s a dilemma that hangs over many other rural, small schools in Alabama and around the country. In addition to losing half of its student population in a short time, the school landed on the state’s ‘failing schools’ list in 2019 after earning an ‘F’ on the state report card. The school has been stuck on the list throughout the pandemic, regardless of the progress they made moving their grade from an ‘F’ to a ‘B’ the following year. The superintendent said there are academic and extracurricular opportunities available at the county’s other schools that are hard to offer at a small high school. “What we learned [from Brown vs. Board], was that the burden of school closures was felt, both socially and emotionally, mostly by Black students,” said Erica Edwards, assistant professor of education at Wayne State University. She said educators in closing schools can face certain stigmas, and that school leaders should make sure that they are investing in culturally responsive practices to ensure a smoother transition. “When these schools close the they begin going to white schools, emotionally you have to bear the brunt of the difference: Being othered, being ostracized, having to prove yourself in ways that predominantly white communities don’t always understand or acknowledge or recognize,” Edwards said.

By Naaz Modan  On Wednesday morning, teachers and students nationwide filed into school hallways and classrooms less than 24 hours after news of another mass school shooting poured out of Uvalde, Texas. Students were required to take final exams, and teachers were expected to grade papers and continue instruction. From the outside, maybe, it looked like business as usual. But many teachers were experiencing emotions ranging from fear and helplessness to stress and nervousness. Nothing is new about the range of emotional, physical and behavioral side effects reported by educators across the nation in the wake of the Uvalde massacre. It is a ripple effect that many teachers have described experiencing after similar mass school shootings: Sandy Hook, Virginia Tech, Sante Fe, Oxford. That’ because those reactions are all symptoms of trauma response, according to Addison Duane, a former elementary school teacher with a Ph.D. in educational psychology and now a professor at Wayne State University. Duane’s research and expertise includes trauma and racism in schools. The trauma experienced after a school shooting can be layered on top of pre-existing traumas resulting from systemic racism, especially for those who work in or are members of communities that have been historically marginalized, like Black, Hispanic and low-income students. Robb Elementary School is a case in point: It is 90% Hispanic and 87% economically disadvantaged, according to school district data. Layering of trauma is now “a ubiquitous part of the U.S. experience,” Duane said.  

By Ethan Bakuli  In recent years, the Detroit Public Schools Community District has prioritized restructuring its GED program. Adult educator Christian Young, a Wayne State University College of Education alumni, was named Adult Educator of the Year by the Michigan Reading Association. Young focuses on welcoming his adult students back to school, recognizing that for many of them, it is the first time they have stepped foot in a classroom in years. For Young, endearing students to class assignments and term papers starts with an autobiographical essay, an exercise that focuses on the student’s life. Not only does it allow him to gauge their writing skills, but it “gives me a window to them as people,” Young said. He added, “I continue to pay attention to them throughout the year and find plenty of ways to incorporate their likes and dreams into the lessons.” 

Thirty-five years after the federal government created a public health campaign to raise awareness of a growing epidemic of alcoholism in the U.S., the problem became more pronounced, especially among young women, during the pandemic. Figures from Nielsen report national alcohol sales surged 54% in March 2020. April is National Alcohol Awareness Month, an opportunity to reexamine your relationship with alcohol, said Erika Bocknek, an associate professor of counseling psychology at Wayne State University. “It’s a moment to step back and reflect before your drinking gets out of hand,” she said. The first step to evaluating your drinking is to ask yourself why you’re having a drink, Bocknek said. “Alcohol plays a pervasive role in our culture, so it’s easy to make drinking issues seem less problematic. It’s important to remember that the problem can be invisible…The reason alcohol works as a coping strategy is because it dulls your senses and forces you to relax,” Bocknek said.  

By Tamara Hew-Butler  Tamara Hew-Butler, associate professor of exercise and sports science in Wayne State University’s College of Education, wrote an article addressing the use of fever reducers and fluids in battling the flu. These well-intentioned and firmly entrenched recommendations offer comfort to those sidelined with fever, flu or vaccine side effects. But, Hew-Butler says you may be surprised to learn the science supporting these recommendations is speculative at best, harmful at worst and comes with caveats. 

By Ken Haddad  As we commemorate Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day in the U.S., it’s important to remember the issues Dr. King fought to resolve, and how problems continue to persist today. In a special video presentation from New Detroit, titled ‘Conversations on Race,’ a group of local voices discuss the way forward on race relations, and share some of their experiences with racism. Truman Hudson, Jr., lecturer and outreach and marketing specialist in the division of teacher education at Wayne State University’s College of Education, is a featured speaker. Hudson says it’s important to talk about race, and structural and institutionalized racism. “…I’m always fighting for positionality that I work with and work for. Not just Black men, but Black women, brown men and brown women, red men and red women. It’s like there’s these racially perceptions of what we can’t do, and when we show up and show out, that can’t be,” he said. “We’re the anomaly – no, there are more of us. You’re just not opening up the doors for us to participate in the conversation. And when you do open up the doors, you want us to speak a certain way, look a certain way, and have a certain tonality when we deliver our presentations. And, don’t let me come across too forceful…so I have to temper my delivery, because if I don’t temper my delivery or firm up my look, there’s a perception that I’m coming across too aggressive…So, I’m always on guard…” 

By Malachi Barrett  Culture war controversy surrounding critical race theory gained new ammunition when a Detroit superintendent acknowledged the concept’s influence on anti-racist efforts in his school district. Conservative activists in Michigan and across the country packed school board meetings this year to denounce the teaching of critical race theory – a graduate-level academic framework that examines how racial groups are affected differently by legal systems and institutions. School officials assert CRT is not part of any curriculum in Michigan, but educators are making commitments to understand their own biases and provide students with a wider view of history. Truman Hudson, a professor of teacher education at Wayne State University, said conversations around CRT have become messy because the term is applied too broadly. Critical race theory is a way of thinking about history, Hudson said, and examining the role of race, class, and gender. Hudson said some of the confusion stems from educators themselves, who also conflate CRT with course material. “This is one lens that we can take to explore historic events in this country,” Hudson said. “The unfortunate part is when you start talking about race, it gets misconstrued that it’s CRT, but it doesn’t have to be. The reality is that race is a concern in this country with or without the framework of CRT.”  

By Ethan Bakuli  Chronic absenteeism rose significantly for Detroit district students last year as families continued to deal with financial, logistical, and health ramifications of the COVID pandemic. A new Wayne State report shows that 70% of Detroit students were chronically absent – missing 10% or last school year – compared with 62% in 2018-2019. About 54% were described as severely chronically absent, meaning they missed 20% or more of the year. The report comes from a representative survey of more than 800 Detroit families as well as student attendance records and administrative data provided by the Detroit school district. At the core of the study’s results, according to Sarah Winchell Lenhoff, an assistant professor of education at Wayne State, are the ongoing social and economic barriers that chronically absent students face, particularly the difficult choices that families are forced to make in order to meet the expectation of good attendance without an adequate kind of social support structure. “We talked to families who had to quit their jobs to make sure their kids are in schools,” Lenhoff said. “Maybe their child’s attendance is better, but then they’re unemployed, and they’re not making any money.”  

By Hani Barghouthi  Gun violence survivors, educators and students gathered on Sunday at a community healing event in downtown Oxford. The event, which was focused on offering mental health resources and resources to the Oxford community and others who were affected by the shooting, was organized by the Michigan chapter of March for Our Lives, a youth-led organization dedicated to gun violence prevention, and the Detroit Area Youth Uniting Michigan, a youth-led social and economic justice organization. Some the support comes from the Mental Health and Wellness Center and the Family and Mental Wellness Lab at Wayne State University, which has been providing in-person and telehealth therapeutic services to people in Metro Detroit who have been affected by the Oxford High shooting. “The kids we’ve spoken to are having a very wide range of feelings, and their feelings are changing all the time,” said Dr. Erika Bockneck, a professor of educational psychology at Wayne State University. “They’re experiencing grief and loss, then the next day they might be feeling really angry. And then there are some days where they’re kids, and I think they’re just not sure what to feel.” In addition to direct counseling, Bocknek and other counselors at the center are working with the Mala Child and Family Institute in Plymouth to develop a free text service where they send out messages of support and information about trauma response.