Student well-being night addresses common concerns for parents

ASCENSION PARISH, La. (WAFB) - “Things are progressively changing, and it’s important for parents to be engaged. You can’t just leave it on the school system.”

For Weston Moreau, things are different for his two boys than it was when he was a student.

“So overall I mean social media. When you get your children video games, Xbox, and Nintendo Switch, you don’t realize that they have access to the whole Internet. I didn’t realize, I thought they were just playing games,” Moreau said.

Moreau says student well-being night in Ascension Parish helped him get a better understanding of what his kids have access to, so he can have better conversations with them.

“Our goal was really to always ensure that we are meeting the needs of our students at every touchpoint,” Robyn Simmons, supervisor of child welfare and attendance said.

School administrators and Ascension Parish Sheriff’s Office deputies talked to students and parents about violence, the dangers of sharing too much information online, and vaping.

“I think that’s across the parish across the state, it’s vaping. Our kids don’t really understand the dangers of it, I mean they come in all these amazing fruity flavors, and so it, it doesn’t seem like it’s something that will harm you, but they’re lacing it with things, and it could very well be, you know, their demise,” Simmons said.

Simmons said they wanted to get ahead of issues seen across the country before they become a major problem here at home.

“We can empower our families as well as our students, so that way we could teach them how to cope, give them tools that they can use, so that way we don’t see an increase in violence as well as mental health issues,” Simmons said.

Speakers tonight encourage students to report anything dangerous they see to the school or their parents.

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