Election Day is now behind us, but its impact may be felt for months, if not years, ahead. Some people are jubilant; others are worried.
In Moorestown, a six-year-old woke up to the news that Donald J. Trump had won and was the president-elect of the United States. His reaction was immediate: a cry of alarm that resonated through the apartment where he lives with his parents and two siblings. “Mommy, the bad guy won. How come?” That day, his mother melted into tears.
His older sister, a high-school sophomore, said that, on the eve of Election Day, students were sharply divided. Some rooted for Donald Trump, while others for Hillary Clinton.
“I knew that either way the winner was going to bring many people to tears,” she wrote in a short, spur-of-the-moment essay that read like a diary entry. After school, she continued, “I went to my room to do homework, with music blasting my ears. I was trying to block out the whole world with music.”
As the founder and chairperson of the Friends Enrichment Program (FEP) for underserved and financially disadvantaged Moorestown children, I have had multiple opportunities over the past 19 years to observe the impact of adult behavior, actions and decisions on young people.
However, I have never lived through an election cycle that troubled children to the extent that this one did. Because of broad access to television and social media, there are probably few school-age children whose thoughts and opinions weren’t influenced by what they saw and heard.
This is sad. Now we must ask ourselves: How can we help our children heal from the shock of Election 2016? As responsible adults, we are all morally obligated to do whatever we can to mend our nation and bridge the divide.
Monique Begg
