How times have changed

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Mom kinda semi-retired from the medical field recently, and just started a new part time job as a school lunch lady for the various schools in the city I live in. Most of those schools are ones I went to growing up. After her first few days on the job, she called me and told me how much has changed since I was a kid. We were both shocked at how the school cafeterias now resemble prisons. Now, at all elementary, middle, and high schools in the city, all students are sat facing only one direction so no one is facing another student, and there is no talking whatsoever. No socializing allowed. I remember lunchtime when I was in school was enjoyable, and plenty of socialization was had. Mom says she was told the school district started doing things this way due to students getting violent with each other and frequently selling drugs starting in the early 2000's here, and with about a quarter of the students being wards of the state due to parents being in jail (and growing up in households with frequent meth usage, since my area has an absurdly high meth usage issue), that can't be good for the mental development of the kids. Raising someone in a prison environment will pretty much ensure they will have a prison mentality when they grow up.

Now granted, my area isn't the best place for opportunity. A lot of the people I went to school with,including some close friends, are still in minimum wage jobs, in prison, or dead. The lucky ones got the hell out and went to Dallas or other major cities after graduating, but no one who stays makes it.

It's just depressing to see the prison society creeping more and more into daily life, slowly enough most won't notice it. If this is the way school is across the US, I don't predict good things for the future of this country.