Supporting Our Youth

A conversation from Torah study earlier this month has lingered with me.  In looking at the part of our story where Joseph’s brothers come to Egypt for food, the text tells us that Joseph recognizes his brothers, but they do not recognize him.  In the chapters that follow, Joseph conceals his own identity and speaks harshly to his brothers, accuses them of being spies, ties one up while the others get Benjamin, and then frames Benjamin for theft.  Is his reaction justified, is it a test of if they have matured or repented for their actions towards him, or is he cruel – giving them a taste of their own medicine, or even more than that?  Why does he continue the cycle of trickery and deception?

As I engaged in conversations with other Jewish educators, the seemingly unconnected topic of student behavior and engagement came up.  One major challenge those who work with youth have encountered in post-pandemic life is the impact on students who came out of the height of COVID-19 after a long, isolating, period of social distancing.  The very distancing that protected their physical health had detrimental impacts on their social-emotional skills and mental health.  Already in the few years before 2020 there had been an uptick in mental health concerns among youth.  The pandemic exacerbated those challenges.  Students also lacked the opportunity to practice many “soft skills” – the non-academic, social-emotional skills needed for success: problem-solving, interpersonal communication, and more.  This manifests in various ways in classroom settings, and the push to get students “back on track” with academic goals often overlooks these soft skills.

This got me thinking back to our Torah narrative.  Our Torah text rarely talks about emotions, motivations, or the internal lives of Biblical figures.  Joseph experienced hardship after hardship, isolated, for far longer than we were, from his family, his homeland, everything he knew – so who did he turn to for support?  How did it feel to have his ‘old life’ put in front of him when his brothers arrived to his ‘new life’ that he built in Egypt?  I ask these questions not to excuse his behavior, but to contextualize it.  Research shows that one of the biggest factors in youth resiliency to adverse events is having one non-parental adult whom they can trust.  Until he rises to Pharaoh’s right-hand man, did Joseph have someone he could trust?  Did he trust Pharaoh? 

Like Joseph, our students working from home, in a large part, lost many interactions with non-family that they trusted, that were their support system.  Who have now found themselves “back to normal” without the same supports they had, without the same skills they had, beforehand.  We have youth who desperately need adults to meet them where they are, instead of bemoaning behavior outbursts and missed benchmarks.  We strive to make our religious school and youth programs places where our youth feel seen and heard.  I love sending them to camp in the summer where they flourish too (and I love that we make camp possible through our camperships – apply here by December 31^st), as camps are a place to extend their support networks and build their self-confidence. 

With winter break upon us, and kids off from school, college students coming home for break, whether they are your own children or “just” ones in the community, make an effort to meet them where they are, hear them, support them, and be that adult they can trust and feel safe around.  May we look with a little less scrutiny at the report card (resume, etc.), and see the whole person in front of us.