First fire, then floods. How a school district helps students recover.
Small hands round clumps of wet clay and compost, forming sticky spheres. Sara Villa watches her second grader, Aaron, focus on the task, his jacket hood raised against the November chill. He’s one of several dozen students on a school excursion at a New Mexico ranch.
The Villas evacuated their nearby Holman home in the spring due to wildfire, then again in the summer due to floods. Because of water damage, the family went into debt purchasing a new mobile home, says Ms. Villa. Other scars are harder to see.
Aaron gets “scared now when it rains,” she says. “I just try to explain to him that he’s OK.”
Aaron, shy, offers a snaggletooth smile. The ball in his mud-smeared palms is stuffed with seeds of native grasses. Students can plant these “seed bombs” where they please, such as at home or here at Collins Lake Ranch, where about half
