Schools and communities can help children bounce back after distressing disasters like the LA wildfires

The 2025 Los Angeles wildfires reduced more than 15,000 structures to ash in a matter of days. Among the devastation were 11 public and private schools and 30 child care facilities. In all, the fires disrupted the education and daily lives of over 700,000 students.

The fires first erupted on Jan. 7, 2025, in the Pacific Palisades, a small enclave of Los Angeles, and in Eaton Canyon, where the tight-knit community of Altadena is nestled in the foothills just north of Pasadena. Fierce winds pushed the flames through neighborhoods, making this one of the top five most destructive wildfires in California history.

In the immediate aftermath of this disaster, much of the focus has been, rightfully, on lives lost, homes damaged or destroyed, and the ability to maintain livelihoods.

Noticeably missing from most media coverage have been the consequences of the wildfires for children.

There was no discussion of the unique challenges they face surrounding disasters.

We are a disaster epidemiologist and a disaster planner at the University of Southern California with almost 40 years of experience between us. We have studied pandemics, tornadoes, hurricanes and earthquakes.

Courtesy R. Burke Rita V. Burke, Associate Professor of Clinical Population and Public Health Sciences, University of Southern California.

Courtesy S. Contreras Sanina Contreras, Assistant Professor of Urban Planning and Spatial Analysis, University of Southern California.

But when the destruction impacts your own community, it hits differently. Like many others, we were directly affected by the school closures and poor air quality in the Los Angeles area.

We both had friends and colleagues who suffered property damage in the fires, including Rita’s best friend who lost her home in the Altadena fire. Our work, which focuses on disaster recovery and resilience in children, suddenly felt deeply personal.

We are currently studying the effect of wildfires on families and what factors help children recover faster and lead to more resilient lives.

The importance of schools

School districts across the region closed their doors due to dangerous air quality and structural damage. This included the Los Angeles Unified School District, which is the second-largest in the nation, serving over 500,000 students. Some schools were destroyed, while others were left with hazardous conditions, including toxic ash from burned homes. Even when schools reopened, many parents and caregivers were worried about sending their children back into classrooms that might not be safe.

This disruption in education extends beyond a few lost school days.

Research shows that prolonged school closures can significantly affect children’s learning, mental health and sense of security. After major disasters, students often experience academic setbacks, increased anxiety, and emotional distress.

According to the Education Recovery Scorecard, as of spring 2024 the average U.S. student remained nearly half a grade level behind prepandemic achievement in math and reading, which points to the long-term impacts of school closures.

Maria Sbytova/Shutterstock

Children need care and routine as adults do the work of disaster recovery.

Rita’s best friend who lost her home shared that when it came to her children, her immediate priority “was getting them back into some type of normalcy.”

To her, this meant sending them back to school, but this wasn’t possible right away. “With the holidays and then the fires, my daughter was out of school for almost two months,” she said.

Her concerns about her children echo those of many parents in the wake of disasters.

Learning from past disasters

After the 2020 Slater Fire in Happy Camp, California, a rural town about 25 miles south of the Oregon border, we conducted focus groups with children who had lost homes and schools.

Our study found that despite experiencing profound loss, many of the children expressed gratitude for their communities and an eagerness to rebuild. Their perspectives revealed both resilience and critical gaps in disaster response – gaps that we see unfolding in Los Angeles today.

One of the biggest lessons from the Slater Fire and other disasters is that children recover best when they are given a sense of stability and normalcy as quickly as possible. The faster children can return to a routine, the better their emotional and academic outcomes tend to be. Schools, child care facilities and structured activities all play a crucial role in this process.

Helping children cope with stress

To assist parents and caregivers in navigating difficult conversations after a natural disaster, substantial research has explored how to talk to kids about disasters.

For families navigating the emotional toll of this disaster, open conversations are key.

Avoiding the topic in an attempt to protect children can make them more anxious. Instead, caregivers should create space for children to express their emotions and ask questions. Children’s responses to trauma vary based on their age and experiences, but common reactions may include anxiety about future wildfires, trouble sleeping, and withdrawing from activities they once enjoyed.

COURTESY OF THE AMERICAN RED CROSS

Children need help from the adults in their lives to cope with stress after a natural disaster.

Children may react differently, and it is important to be on the lookout for signs of stress. Younger children between ages 1 and 5 may become more irritable and may exhibit signs of developmental regression.

[Related: In adolescence, every experience matters. Let’s make the ones we design count]

Older children between the ages of 14 and 18 may begin to show signs of depression or isolate themselves. They may also begin to act out or engage in risk-taking behaviors. Strategies that can help children process the experience include:

• maintaining routines,
• keeping an open line of communication,
• encouraging creative outlets, and,
• modeling desired behaviors.

Tweens and teens may also find comfort in the shared experience with their friends.

Rita’s best friend shared that her 11-year-old daughter and 10 of her friends named their chat group “70% homeless,” a telling reflection of how they are processing the disaster together.

Caring for our children after a disaster

Organizations such as Project:Camp, a nonprofit that provides pop-up camps for children affected by disasters, have stepped in to offer immediate child care relief in Eagle Rock, California, about 8 miles from Altadena. These programs not only support children’s mental health by offering structured, trauma-informed care in a fun environment, but they also give caregivers the time and space necessary to begin rebuilding their lives.

[Related: ‘Bereavement Deserts’ — Amid a rise in parental deaths, grief in children is often overlooked]

The services provided by these sorts of programs can serve as models that can be incorporated into the planning process for cities and counties. This allows more time for adults to focus on recovery needs while limiting the time that children must spend alone.

For families still struggling after the LA fires, we recommend:

• talking to school counselors,
• seeking community support, and
• contacting local disaster relief programs.

Looking ahead

Rebuilding after a disaster is about more than just reconstructing homes and infrastructure.

It’s about restoring a sense of security for families, especially children.

If there is one thing our research has taught us, it is that children are incredibly resilient. But resilience is not built in isolation. Rather, it comes from strong support systems, thoughtful policies and communities that put their youngest members first in times of crisis. Prioritizing schools and child care centers in recovery plans helps to ensure that children can return to safe, supportive environments as soon as possible.

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Rita V. Burke, Associate Professor of Clinical Population and Public Health Sciences, University of Southern California Burke’s research focuses on pediatric disaster preparedness and injury prevention. Her work includes evaluating gaps and identifying barriers in health and school systems to meet the needs of children, particularly those with access and functional needs, in a disaster. She is co-author of the book Landesman’s Public Health Management of Disasters and Associate Editor of Disaster Management and Public Health Preparedness. She is also the co-chair of the Los Angeles Children in Disasters Working Group and member of the Scientific Advisory Council for the American Red Cross.

Santina Contreras, Assistant Professor of Urban Planning and Spatial Analysis, University of Southern California Santina Contreras is an Assistant Professor of Urban Planning and Spatial Analysis at the USC Sol Price School of Public Policy. Her research focuses on interrogating community engagement practices surrounding hazards and disasters. Specifically, this involves examining the implementation, equitability, and underlying power dynamics associated with community engagement activities in hazard, disaster, and environmental planning spaces. In her work, she takes an interdisciplinary approach toward understanding relationships between local communities and external stakeholders (organizations, planners, engineers, etc.) to highlight the ways in which inequitable engagement approaches undertaken by these entities can lead to the overburdening and extraction of local communities.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Disclosure statement:

Rita V. Burke received funding from funding from the Natural Hazards Center at the University of Colorado Boulder with the Support of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Science Foundation for this work. She is also funded by the Department of Health and Human Services Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response. She is also Chair of the Board of Advisors for Project:Camp.

Santina Contreras receives funding from the Natural Hazards Center at the University of Colorado Boulder with the Support of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Science Foundation.