There's a lot of economic inequality in the United States, just like there is around the world. No matter how good a country we think it is, the fact remains that too many families and individuals fall through the cracks daily. This issue has really been brought to the forefront during the health crisis, as many families have reported having difficulty accessing the internet and tools their children need to succeed at remote learning.
Two school-age children in Salinas, California, were photographed in the parking lot of a Taco Bell, where they were using the restaurant's Wi-Fi and hurriedly attempting to complete assignments. Salinas is about an hour south of Silicon Valley, which is home to numerous start-ups and global technology companies. This disjointed reality makes the differences that families and children are experiencing feel even starker.
People were immediately outraged and concerned about the children. Some were worried that they could be removed from their mother's care, while others were insisting that they should be. It's likely that such an action would be catastrophic for the girls, especially given the current climate. Luckily, the community rallied around the family, and for now, the children are all able to complete their schoolwork from a hotel room.
The digital divide is real, and many underserved communities suffer from its effects. California Senator Kevin de León pointed out that 40% of Latinos in California don't have internet access. This definitely makes distance learning nearly impossible for a lot of students and their families.
Salinas City Elementary School soon acknowledged that the students were enrolled at the school and noted that staff was working to help the family. Unfortunately, the incident triggered a welfare check, and Child Protective Services showed up to interview the family about what exactly was going on.
A person who claims to be working with the mother of the children in the photo noted that the situation was really confusing. When the school showed up at their home to deliver two mobile hot spots, the police and DCS came with them. The police began accusing the mom of child endangerment, when she was doing her best to make this really confusing and awful time work for her kids.
The person writes, "The mother of the 2 little girls who went viral for sitting outside of Taco Bell in efforts to attend their online Distance Learning received backlash from the police. Is this how we treat our essential workers who are doing their best to survive on top of supporting their children during this new way of distance learning?"
"I'm so tired of the way my people are being treated, do those cops know these are the people putting food on their table? You think they would mind if we told them to go pick their own [expletive] dinner on the fields with no protection instead of taking the time to harass our essential workers and threatening them with child separation?"
Happily, it seems that the situation has concluded and that the mother and her children are all safe and, mostly importantly, together.
The same person updated their account a few hours later:
"I'm so thankful for individuals like @awkwardspice she reached out to me and told me she was in contact with the mother last night. We got in touch and this morning we cleared our schedule to do what we could to help this family immediately. I am so thankful this mother allowed us to assist her and her daughters. She kept refusing our help but we kept insisting."
"She finally agreed to accept the help and we moved quickly. We helped the family pack and took their belongings to the storage. The girls and their mom are now SAFE tonight ♥️ thank you @awkwardspice for reaching out it meant so much being able to help this family together today. You are such a beautiful soul. She has just started a Gofundme for these girls and it would mean a lot if you all donated the link is in my bio as well, these funds will be given directly to this family to help them pay a month or two or more of rent depending on your donations."
They also plan to keep working with the family:
"We will be assisting this family this week until we get them on their feet. These girls are so excited to learn and they love their education. The first thing the oldest daughter mentioned is how she's so excited to have her own library the mother was so shocked by the support and was in disbelief, and we simply told her, please accept our help, your daughters are the future, one of these girls could be the next to change the world please let us help. So thankful she trusted us."
Happily, the GoFundMe that's been set up for the family has already met and exceeded its goal of $20,000. You can still donate to the family if you'd like to, as every dollar makes it that much more likely that this family will be able to weather the health crisis, and these children will be able to continue to learn.
For what it's worth, the investigation that CPS and the police launched found no evidence of child neglect or endangerment. They did find that the family's landlord was about to kick them out and essentially leave them homeless, which makes the GoFundMe all the more important.
