At 8:05 a.m. a student ran into my classroom with tears in their eyes. We talked together until the bell rang, after which they headed to their first-period class no longer wanting to go home and certainly more prepared to learn.

So it began, my first student interaction on my first day of a new job, all before school started.

This is why I am here , I thought.

In 2024, Planned Parenthood Los Angeles hired and trained 16 health educators to expand the Wellbeing Center project, a program designed by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health to bring mental and sexual health services to public high school students right on their campuses. I was in that new cohort of educators, working with others to staff more than 20 centers at L.A. high schools, with plans to expand to 50 in t

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