Michael Levine is Executive Director of the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop. He collaborates and supports NCFL on strategies of mutual interest. To access more about the Cooney Center as well as their study Getting Over the Slump, click here. This study investigates how emerging media can produce a powerful new learning equation that can stimulate both our early education system and our children’s abilities to innovate and create. Print copies are available upon request.

Let me share a quick story about a different sort of “recession.”

A criminal court judge told a friend of mine recently that he had noticed a new trend — a new set of designer drugs was wreaking havoc at the local high school at the same time that a local factory had closed. Still the judge commented: “We don’t have a drug crisis.” The facts said otherwise, with juvenile offender cases up 40% since the economic downturn.

My friend said, “It’s not a drug crisis…what we have is a literacy and dropout crisis. In the past two years there has not been a single conviction of an individual who had a high school diploma.”

So what can we do about the literacy and economic “recessions?” Without new allies and innovative solutions, we will never ‘get over the slump.’ Let’s look for new and novel ways to create a powerful connection across generations to find new solutions.

The Cooney Center is working closely with organizations such as NCFL to leverage the power of games and other digital media that children gravitate to, and which could be a powerful antidote to less pro-social behaviors.

Recently we held a design workshop to create a new intergenerational video game that we will test in communities next year. NCFL President Sharon Darling is a key contributor to our work, and you can see her talk about the project on YouTube.

Let’s also commit to engage law enforcement. They are probably the best spokespeople for convincing voters to think long-term. We have a terrific ally in Fight Crime: Invest in Kids, the organization of police chiefs which is advocating for early education and afterschool programs as a wise, cost-effective strategy.