We are Addison Savoy and Maggie vanRosmalen.

We are students attending big picture middle school and have realized a major problem BSD is facing - the lack of attention towards mental health of students and staff alike. BSD seems to mainly focus on faster techniques of teaching that mainly damage students mental health and once recognized it is ignored, as many students are upset with the news of Microsoft Teams®  chat being removed as it lowers their chances to be able to communicate with friends and siblings from other schools that are unable to see them from this current situation. While BSD claims they prioritize freedom of speech they clearly lack in their statement. "In most reviews and opinions on BSD people mention how the education is affecting their kids, but they fail to mention how their kids emotions and mental health are being affected" Maggie stated, "My own mother has worked with BSD as an assistant teacher at Ardmore Elementary where I used to attend from age 5-11, she has suffered from mental health issues some of the main ones being depression and autism, she asked BSD to accommodate to her needs, but they refused. One of the simple things she requested was to inform her if she would be switching the grade level she was teaching in, they failed to do that which caused her to have a panic attack one day and leave work, instead of being worried and questioning the reason they scolded her for randomly leaving work."  

Our mothers deserve to be recognized, their pay is awful for what they suffer through, and they deserved to be paid higher for all the effort and money they spend on the children. This was before the pandemic so they were stable, they have no reason to do this to teachers.

BSD fails awfully to recognize the health of students and teachers alike along with other countless problems such as financial decisions and important choice making.

One of the biggest things that affected us is bullying, this ties into mental health issues, here are just a few bullying incidents that BSD has failed to stop.

-Being touched uncomfortably and still being put in the same class as the student for 3 years until graduation -Maggie

- Watching as teacher being accustom to brain damage via student and it being brushed off. -Addie

- People drawing inappropriate and racial / sexist remarks in public areas in school. 

 -Lewis

-  There being a lockdown and students not being notified about the situation nor being properly protected by admins at  Big Picture, - Addie

- Being bullied for being part of the LGBTQ+ and instead of being noticed and putting an end to the bullying being questioned if I was "sure" if I was part of the LGBTQ+ -Maggie

- Staff of aftercare not caring about students and harassing them often, once admins were told of the situation they did not take action. - Addie

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Us students and staff deserve to be recognized as people and not as mindless workers designed to give them a good reputation. Someone has lost their life because of their ways of handling the mental health issues.

What we covered here wasn't even 1/4 of the issues, there are many more that are out of our reach as BSD tries to cover them up.