Boston Public Schools Behavioral Health Services Director Does Facebook Live From Crowded Disney Park While Schools Remain Closed Due To COVID
Andria Amado is the Director of Behavioral Health Services for the Boston Public Schools.
The BPS opened the year remotely, went to a hybrid model despite protestations from the teacher’s union, and then went right back to remote because “cases” increased. And we all should be frightened by the word cases because your child might catch a sniffle. The result of this is that vulnerable kids in need of immediate services are in danger because the only lifeline that some of these kids have is the structure that their school provides for them.
Andria Amador’s job is critical right now, since at risk kids need behavioral health services more than ever. She articulate why in a story in Ed Week in May.
Not being able to meet with students in person has been a big challenge for school psychologists and counselors. Another hurdle: It’s tough to provide adequate confidentiality when meeting with students virtually. Boston Public Schools is continuing to provide counseling services virtually to students and their parents. But it’s not as simple as just hopping on a Zoom meeting, said Andria Amador, the director of Behavioral Health Services at Boston Public Schools.
“When you’re seeing a child in your office at your school, you have a secure environment,” she said. “But in a home where there are other kids or other family members, or some of our families who are homeless … there may not be a physical location for the child to go and have a confidential conversation.”
The district has been training its mental health staff since schools closed on how to provide teletherapy. Instead of discussing deeply personal issues with students in ways that may run afoul of confidentiality rules, Amador said, school psychologists and counselors in her district are using that time to help students strengthen their coping skills—whether it be breathing exercises to manage anxiety, developing time-management strategies, or brainstorming ideas for how to get along with family members.
Translation – kids aren’t getting the services they need because the people causing most of their problems are sitting next to them on the couch. Children in Boston continue to suffer because of the selfish adults tasked with educating them, who are so cowardly that they would allow these kids to suffer in order to avoid a virus that has almost no chance of killing them.
She also purports to care a lot about the kids as a school psychologist, and makes $140K a year.
But according to a BPS teacher, Andria is using the time off to head to Disney.
Luckily she work a mask. As long as you wear a mask you can do whatever you want and COVID no longer exists. Kind of like how teachers can protest in large groups, but they just can’t be around children.
Andria Amador’s Facebook page has privacy restrictions, but we received some screenshots. Here she is two days ago posting images of her and the family at Epcot.
I realize it doesn’t say the date on that screenshot, but unless the person who took them has been holding onto them since before March, just so they could frame her, she went to Florida during the “pandemic.” You’ll notice that everyone is wearing masks in the pictures, and the woman who commented about the long lines didn’t use that profile picture until September 12.
So it’s recent.
Kids need mental health services now more than ever, especially in places like Boston. Last week a student in Fall River died from starvation, which would not have happened to him if he had gotten free lunch and breakfast in school. The needs of children have been put to the side because adults are afraid of a virus. No one cares about the psychological effects on children when they don’t get to see or make friends, never see anyone smile due to masks, or are stuck in homes with little parental support. Kids need schools to access guidance counselors and behavior health specialists like Andria Amador, but they can’t get them because Andria is pretending to be afraid of a virus.
But of course none of these people are actually afraid of COVID. If they were then they’d never leave their homes under any circumstances. There is no way to stop the spread of an airborne disease, and its ridiculous to try. Andria is higher risk than most people, due to her age and health, but even she’s not worried about it. She’d never get on a crowded plane, or go to the state with one of the highest amount of “cases” in the country if she was.
Truth be told I don’t even fault her for going to Disney. People should live their lives without fear if they want to. My issue is with the fact that they’ll use the virus as justification to keep the schools closed for longer, and then flagrantly show the world that they’re not too worried by going on Facebook live at Disney World. But hey, tell me more about your “plan” for reopening Andria.
Today at Noon, I'm joining Andria Amador @BostonSchools Director of Behavioral Health Services for Lunch & Learn about Mental Health Services in the BPS reopening plan.
Please attend and RSVP at https://t.co/SxmtSWmxwy! #bospoli #bosEDpoli #MAEDu pic.twitter.com/55FHnck254
— Annissa Essaibi George (@AnnissaForBos) September 18, 2020
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