[slavboj]

School attendance is reliably associated with student suicide rate. We know it's causal because the association tracks random variations in the school year (snow days and make-up days, teacher strikes, differences in district calendars, etc). So forgive me if I believe their concern to be less than genuine.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/childrens-risk-of...

[LarryMullins]

Attending school might increase the suicide rate, but education doubtlessly has more than enough upsides to offset that harm.

TikTok though? I don't think so. No upside of TikTok can compare to the upside of receiving an education.

[Der_Einzige]

How many educated kids are worth 1 suicide?

I mean this quite seriously because utilitarian body count calculations are made by the US government all the time, especially in the context of transportation infrastructure. What's a good multiplyer? 10000 kids educated per suicide?

[LarryMullins]

Even if suicides were a thousand times more common, I think the advantages of an educated population would still favor keeping schools open.

Of course if practical measures can be taken today which suppress the suicide rate while still compelling kids to receive educations, I support those measures. But to do away with compulsory schooling to suppress the suicide rate is throwing the baby out with the bath water. With TikTok, there is no baby. It's all bath water.

[Auracle]

In my experience, which in unfortunately way too much, people commit suicide when they feel trapped in a bad situation. It’s hard to think of a more likely scenario than someone that’s having a bad time at school. I hope every parent out there starts to offers up online schooling as “always an option.” It would have saved some friends of mine.

[matheweis]

Yes. NBER recently published some similar stats in the context of the lockdowns:

> suicides among 12-to-18-year-olds are highest during months of the school year and lowest during summer months

> returning [post lockdowns] from online to in-person schooling was associated with a 12-to-18 percent increase teen suicides.

https://www.nber.org/papers/w30795

[lordfrito]

What is it that you're suggesting? That school attendance is a cause of suicide? That can't be... because if so then it's a miracle for all of us who made it before hand that we survived such a dangerous place and built the modern world and all.

Understand that any time you leave your house you run the risk of having a bad day. So for kids, who regularly leave their house for school, it makes sense that the primary factor leading to a "bad day" for a kid would occur in or around campus. And I can totally believe there's a causal link between when someone chooses to commit suicide and the kind of day they were having.

I'm just not sure what you're suggesting. Are we all just supposed to stay home? That's not workable. You have to face the world.

Also you take a chance every time you get in your car to go anywhere. Doesn't mean we should avoid automobiles.

I'm not trying to be sarcastic... Just trying to understand the angle you're after with this stat.

[tzs]

You seem to be assuming that they can't be concerned with more than one problem simultaneously. You also seem to be assuming that addressing social media problems in schools won't help address the suicide problem. You also seem to be assuming that they aren't already doing something to address the suicide problem.

[slavboj]

Unlike the entirety of the tech system, the school system is ipso facto in charge of the school system's own operation. I'm sure Altria is working real hard on a non-cancerous cigarette too.