Tagged With "safe schools"
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OurSOLES youth leaders led trauma-informed presentation before educators and school staff
OurSOLES (Our Students of Leadership ~ Empowerment ~ Service) high school students from the City Heights neighborhood of San Diego, CA, led an interactive, hour-long trauma-informed presentation for Diego Valley and Diego Springs Public Charter School educators, tutors, school administration and staff last August 14, 2015.
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Over 100 pastoral education students trained in trauma at regional meeting in Baltimore
The theme of trauma was selected for this year’s annual summer Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) Day because “clergy responses to trauma an have a significant impact on our own healing and in healing our communities,” as described in the planning committee welcome letter. Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore hosted the gathering of over 100 pastoral students from the Maryland, Washington, DC, and Northern Virginia region. Planning Committee Chair Ty Crowe, director of the Hospital’s Spiritual...
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Pacific Southwest Mental Health Technology Transfer Center Summer 2019 Learning Institute!
The Pacific Southwest Mental Health Technology Transfer Center is incredibly excited to announce that registration is open for our Pacific Southwest Mental Health Technology Transfer Center Summer 2019 Learning Institute ! What: Two days of incredibly high quality faculty (e.g. David Shonfeld from the National School Crisis & Bereavement Center! Yolo Akili Robinson from the Black Emotional & Mental Health Collective!) offering intensive learning sessions to support the mental health...
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PAPER TIGERS Educational Version Now Available on DVD or Digital Streaming!
From Tugg.com, March 17, 2016 Tugg Edu is proud to present the highly anticipated ACEs documentary PAPER TIGERS to the educational marketplace. Directed by James Redford ( THE BIG PICTURE: RETHINKING DYSLEXIA, RESILIENCE ), PAPER TIGERS follows a year in the life of an alternative high school that has radically changed its approach to disciplining its students, becoming a promising model for how to break the cycles of poverty, violence and disease that affect families. With over 450...
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Parent Handouts: Understanding ACEs, Parenting to Prevent & Heal ACEs (English)
Please see the main post for these parent handouts in the ACEs Connection Resources Center. These two flyers ( Understanding ACEs and Parenting to Prevent & Heal ACEs ) can be downloaded, distributed, and used freely. One is brand new and the other is a revision. Both flyers were made with generous support from Family Hui, a Program of Lead for Tomorrow. Translations of these flyers are in progress and will be shared by Family Hui and updated on ACEs Connection when available.
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Parenting Students Get Extra Help During Remote Learning (learn4life.org)
Every year, 25,000 teens give birth in California – and 70 percent of teen moms don’t graduate high school. About 1,300 of Learn4Life students are pregnant or parenting, so we are doing everything we can to keep these young mothers engaged in school and learning parenting skills – even during remote learning. Before COVID-19 forced remote learning, parenting teens could bring their babies to school while they studied and took tests. A separate child-friendly area ensured they didn’t disrupt...
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Parents Often Battle To Get Their Children Mental Health Services At School [KHN.org]
On a hot summer day last month, Sydney, 15, and Laney, 8, were enjoying their last two weeks of freedom before school started. The sisters tried to do flips over a high bar at a local playground. “You’ve got to pull your hips into the bar, like you’ve got to kick up like that,” explained their mother, Selena. “I tried to kick! I did this — you told me not to stick out,” said Laney indignantly. Both girls have been diagnosed with mental illnesses — Sydney with bipolar disorder and Laney with...
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Parkland and Santa Fe Schools Disclose Devastating After-Effects of Shootings [politico.com]
By Nicole Gaudiano, Politico, October 10, 2019 Substance abuse and mental health problems surged following last year’s deadly mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., while test scores tanked. More kids are said to be anxious, depressed and cutting school. In Santa Fe, Texas, where eight students and two teachers were killed in May of last year, it’s a similar story, according to documents obtained by POLITICO. A growing number of students need support from...
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Partnership expands mental health resources for schools [news.iu.edu]
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- Indiana University's Indiana School Mental Health Initiative has partnered with The Lutheran Foundation to provide online resources to support schools and community partners as they address students' social, emotional, behavioral and mental health needs. The Lutheran Foundation’s statewide LookUp Indiana website provides information along with a resource directory of mental health provider agencies searchable by name, city or ZIP code. The Indiana School Mental Health...
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Pathways to Policy [changelabsolutions.org]
Young people are raising their voices to create safer, healthier communities—even if they’re not old enough to vote yet. From #NeverAgain to #MeToo, young people have been at the forefront of advocacy movements for decades, their passion and idealism sparking millions of people to take action. How can we channel that energy in a way that can lead to concrete public policy change? We created Pathways to Policy to answer that question—and to support young people in their pursuit of a better...
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Peace Rooms and Mindfulness: New School Discipline Philosophy One Year Later [peoriapublicradio.org]
School districts had a year to implement a state law that banned zero-tolerance policies and emphasized restorative justice practices. We check back in with five districts we visited in the summer of 2016 to see how school discipline has changed. On the second day of the school year, Amber Owens got the kind of jolt every parent dreads. She was called to the nurse’s office at Champaign’s Bottenfield Elementary, where she found her 7-year-old son, Simon, sobbing uncontrollably and bleeding...
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Peek Inside a Classroom: Jasmine
© Elliot Gilfix/Flickr . What happened to Jasmine? . Photo © Jinx!/Flickr When you look inside a...
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Peek Inside a Classroom: Danny
When you look inside a classroom, there are some things you can not see . . .
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Peek Inside a Classroom: Jasmine
Wiry, active, savvy. Jasmine. There were not many good days. . . only random moments of calm in a violent storm, erupting on a ‘hair trigger’
When you look inside a classroom there are some things you can not see….
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Peek Inside a Classroom: Jose
Photo credit Max Klingensmith at flickr . Jose was one of the calmest, quietest, most peaceful boys in the classroom. The kind of boy everybody loves. ...
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Peninsula School District takes proactive approach to support students with traumatic experiences [TheNewsTribune.com]
Any elementary school principal has hundreds of stories featuring the actions and activities — both amusing and alarming — of their young students. These educators will be the first to tell you that kids can do crazy, outlandish and sometimes surprising things — all part of being a typical child. But Peninsula School District elementary principals noticed a growing trend of extreme behaviors in the last few years among their youngest students, behaviors that are not normal or considered part...
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Personalized Restorative Justice Best Way to Teach Traumatized Students, Conferees Told [JJIE.org]
A white board with a giant illustration of the human brain sat in the middle of the room, a constant reminder, participants said, that any real attempts to treat juvenile offenders begins not with detention or tough love, but with science. Many of the teens who find themselves in the juvenile system or alternative school programs have grown up with trauma that directly impacts their cognitive functions, said Pender Makin, assistant superintendent of schools in Brunswick, Maine. Physical...
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Philadelphia school offers program on teaching traumatized children
Cheyney University, the Pennsylvania's state-owned historically black university is launching a new program this summer to train teachers on the ins and outs of helping traumatized children to learn. The certificate program “Trauma-informed Education,” or TIES will be offered at Cheyney's Center City campus in Philadelphia. Its launch comes as Cheyney, which boasts an identity as the nation's oldest historically black post-secondary education institution, struggles to climb out of a downward...
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Philly Kindergartners Will No Longer Be Suspended [PhillyMag.com]
Philly’s youngest students will no longer be suspended from school for misbehavior. The School Reform Commission announced today that it has approved revisions to the Student Code of Conduct that will remove suspensions as punishment for Kindergarten students. “We remain focused on academic achievement, children reading on grade level, and college and career readiness. The early years are the most important, and we need students in school,” said Superintendent William Hite in a statement .
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Pitt Urban Education Forum Explores Disrupting School-to-Prison Pipeline [diverseeducation.com]
By LaMont Jones, Diverse Education, August 12, 2019 Using education and activism to disrupt the school-to-prison pipeline is an ongoing battle that is as fierce as ever, according to speakers at the 2019 Summer Educator Forum presented by the Center for Education at the University of Pittsburgh. In panel discussions and breakout sessions during the three-day event in July, a record 450 students, teachers, administrators, scholars, activists and experts in education, criminal justice and...
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Pittsburgh's 'Dr. Stress' plans a new program for troubled students [Post-Gazette.com]
Only in this century have science and society come to understand the mental and physical repercussions of a rough childhood. But 18 years after publication of the groundbreaking Adverse Childhood Experiences study and multiple follow-up studies, few resources yet exist to help children contend with or avoid the troubling list of childhood adversity — sexual, verbal and physical abuse; neglect; poverty; community violence; and bullying, among others. These exposures cumulatively scar a...
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Place Matters
Place matters. It was spring break of 1993 – my senior year of high school – and I was driving back from Virginia Beach with three close friends. We passed signs for the University of Delaware. I asked if we could take a quick detour to see the campus. The one request literally changed the course of my life – forever. University of Delaware in Spring It was late in April and I had been accepted to UD but never set foot in the town of Newark, DE. Little did I know it would be the campus of my...
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Plymouth County Schools Receiving Trauma Informed Training
This opportunity is for schools and districts to receive training to develop an awareness of the prevalence of traumatic experience, its impact on academic behavior and relations and the need for a whole school approach. For the 2019-2020 school year, Carver, Marshfield, Rockland, Scituate and Silver Lake qualified to receive free training from TLPI.
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Podcast on application of trauma-informed principles amidst COVID
Check out this podcast from the Trauma-Informed Educators Network Podcast ( https://soundcloud.com/mathew-portell-93233744/episode-14-dr-eric-rossen ) - focused on applying the 6 Principles of Compassionate, Trauma-Informed Schools, including during the current school closures from COVID.
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Poet Linda McCarriston Reads “Hotel Nights With My Mother” (www.billmoyers.com/vimeo) & Note
I used to hate summers and holidays as a kid because it meant too much time at home and too much time, unstructured, with people who weren't safe. For me, that was my biological father, my first step-father and two step-siblings and I didn't hate long breaks and time away from school. I loved September and when Christmas break was over. This isn't a post about what happened to me as a kid. It's a reminder for teachers that home can be hard and what you do, allow, see and witness, even...
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Poetry in Motion: Drama Lit Team Preps for Spring Slams By Elisa Knoell Learn4Life Student
Imagine the power of putting a handful of kids together in a class to tell their stories in their own words—and earn credits in the process. This school year, Learn4Life’s Innovation High School (IHS) San Diego – Lakeside is offering a spoken word poetry course titled “Dramatic Literature”. The course engages youth in classic works of literature and empowers teens to take charge of their own futures and unearth their potential. Annabelle Reyes, a Drama Lit student, told how beneficial the...
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Polling American K-12 Parents About COVID-19 [edchoice.org]
By Paul Diperna, EdChoice, April 21, 2020 The COVID-19 pandemic is affecting all of our lives in unique ways. Our team has been adapting some of our work to be more responsive to the extraordinary times we are living in right now. One of our goals is to inform policymakers, stakeholders and the public about school choice programs and to better understand choice in the larger context of American K–12 education. That context has gone through a seismic shift during recent months. In partnership...
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Positive Childhood Experiences May Buffer Against Health Effects Of Adverse Ones [npr.org]
By Selena Simmons-Duffin, National Public Radio, September 9, 2019 Plenty of research shows that adverse childhood experiences can lead to depression and other health problems later in life. But researcher Christina Bethell wondered whether positive experiences in childhood could counter that. Her research comes from a personal place. In the 1970s, in a low-income housing complex in Los Angeles, Bethell had a tough childhood. Sometimes she didn't have money for lunch. Sometimes, when a free...
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Positive Discipline in the Classroom Workshop- Apr 2 - May 7
"I love how interactive this workshop is and how open and honest we were allowed to be. I felt respected as an educator and human, and I feel empowered and encouraged..." Elementary School Teacher This Positive Discipline in the Classroom 5-week workshop gives educators tools to create a classroom and school environment where students feel encouraged and engaged in learning, solve their own friendship issues, and feel a sense of connection and value. As an educator you will feel a sense of...
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Posltive Pax: Yakima Valley schools embrace program that teaches kids to be good people — and good students [YakimaHerald.com]
In Raul Hernandez’ Discovery Lab classroom in Yakima, his fifth-grade students are in a flurry working on lines for a poem. Then they hear the melodic “zwoop” of a harmonica, and all noise and movement stop in an instant. Hands go up in a two-fingered peace sign. All eyes are on the teacher. This is PAX, and it’s out to change the world. The PAX Good Behavior Game is an evidence-based program to help teachers and students build a safe, teamlike classroom environment, where the focus is on...
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Post-Harvey, Houston Teachers Learn to Respond to Trauma [prweb.com]
One year after Hurricane Harvey, Houston-area teachers have a new tool to respond to children who have experienced trauma or distress through a new online professional development program. The program was developed through a collaboration between UNICEF USA , Mental Health America of Greater Houston (MHA of Greater Houston), and health simulation company Kognito . The program, titled Trauma-Informed Practices for K-12 Schools (TPS), is a 30-45-minute online simulation that builds educators’...
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Post-Harvey Mental Health Support Sees Continued Demand, New Concerns (houstonpublicmedia.org)
School counselors are seeing further concerns underneath Harvey trauma When Tropical Storm Harvey flooded Houston, it was easy to see the effects. First, all the homes damaged or destroyed, and later on financial spreadsheets when the billions in losses that were tallied. However, many Houstonians are dealing with a less obvious effect from the storm on their lives — psychological trauma. “I think it was so immediately relevant to those administrators because they themselves were...
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Potential impact of Trauma on special education eligibility
This is a follow up to my previous email concerning the PP v Compton class action lawsuit concerning adverse events and eligibility under the Americans with Disability act. I did a presentation at the Legal Issues in Special Education conference on April 24th. The participants consisted of special education directors, compliance officers and parent advocates The big surprise was that there was huge interest in this issue. It was standing room only in the room. Secondly even though this...
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Poverty seen as factor in dropout rate (Wilkesboro, NC) [JournalPatriot.com]
Local school officials say worsening economic problems in the last decade are adversely impacting student success and likely played a role in last year’s 63.5 percent increase in the Wilkes County high school dropout rate. The dropout rate rose from 1.71 in the 2013-14 school year to 2.68 in 2014-15. Last year’s rate was the highest since 3.50 in 2009-10 and the first increase since 2008-09. “The economic problems that families are facing (in Wilkes) are huge,” said April Marr, director of...
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Power Is Knowledge: New Study Finds That Wealthy, Educated Families Are Using School Ratings to Self-Segregate [the74million.org]
This is the latest article in The 74’s ongoing ‘ Big Picture ’ series, bringing American education into sharper focus through new research and data. Go Deeper: See our full series . If there’s one thing parents, real estate agents, and educators all understand implicitly, it’s this: High property values are built on top-notch school districts. Excellent schools are considered so precious, parents will risk huge fines and even jail sentences by enrolling their children under false pretenses.
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‘Power of Kindness’ video goes before Solano supervisors (dailyrepublic.com)
Four students from Buckingham Charter Magnet School will be honored by the Solano County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday as winners of the 2017 Power of Kindness Campaign. The Power of Kindness Campaign was sponsored by District Attorney Krishna Abrams and Supervisor John Vasquez “to bring students together and increase overall happiness on our school campuses,” a county document states. The Buckingham Charter students won the competition with their video, “The Power of One,” the message of...
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Pre-K Teachers Are Making House Calls. It’s Helping Kids Succeed. [nytimes.com]
By Christina Caron and Katherine Zoepf August 22, 2019 In more than 700 communities across the country, teachers are supporting students of all ages — and their parents — outside the classroom. Even for the youngest children, the benefits can be profound. Yumna al-Kashto is only 4, but she’s already had to adapt to lots of changes in her life. She was born in Antakya, Turkey, after intense fighting forced her parents and four older siblings to flee their home in Idlib, the Syrian opposition...
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Pre-parenting curriculum for teens
If you are working with teens to plan bright futures, we would like to offer you a Sample Lesson Plan from our Healthy Foundations for Future Families curriculum. For the past 10 years, our organization Educate Tomorrow’s Parents (ETP), has been working upstream to prevent Adverse Childhood Experiences by educating teens before they form families. Our science-based curriculum meets essential standards for secondary school health education. There are several components, including a student...
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Preparing teachers to personalize their classrooms (edsource.org)
Teacher residency programs, which are modeled on medical residencies, are growing in popularity as a way to improve teacher effectiveness. Future teachers learn the craft by working for a year with experienced teachers, who provide guidance, feedback and support. But Summit’s program is the first of its kind to prepare teachers to lead classrooms structured around personalized learning, said Pam Lamcke, director of the program. Personalized learning enables students to learn academic content...
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PRESS RELEASE - U.S. Department of Education Awards More Than $6.5 Million in Grants to Help Schools and Communities Promote Equity in Education [www.ed.gov]
SEPTEMBER 29, 2016 Contact: Press Office, (202) 401-1576, press@ed.gov The U.S. Department of Education is awarding more than $6.5 million in grants to fund four regional Equity Assistance Centers to support schools and communities creating equitable education opportunities for all students. These centers, authorized under Title IV of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, will provide technical assistance in the preparation and implementation of plans for the desegregation of public schools...
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Principal starts 'No phone, new friends Friday' lunchtime tradition
Thanks to Northwest PBIS Network, Inc. for sharing this on Facebook. Jackie Kennon - KCRG.com, Eastern Iowa, November 8, 2019 'No phone, new friends Fridays' is a new tradition at Iowa Valley Junior-Senior High School in Marendo. Principal Janet Behrens started it this year. She says she noticed students at the school with their heads down, looking at their phones. Instead, she wanted them to look at each other, and learn face-to-face communication skills. Students like junior Page Weick say...
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Program gives Spokane schools resources to help students rise above adversity
By Jim Allen , Thu., Oct. 24, 2019 Think of it as a well-school checkup. On Tuesday morning at Bemiss Elementary School, educators and health professionals spoke enthusiastically about something called Resilience in School Environments, or RISE. A collaboration between Kaiser Permanente and the Spokane and West Valley school districts, the RISE program is expected to lift up teachers and administrators and give them tools to cope with all the challenges of the modern student. The challenges...
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Program offers hundreds of young men, boys safe space to heal from ACEs
Dennis McCollins recounts some of the experiences that caused him to harden against the world as a teenager. “There were times I went to more funerals than birthdays,” says McCollins, who is the clinical director of the School Based Health Center at Greenwood Academy in Richmond, Calif. And it took its toll: “I spent time homeless. I got expelled [from school]. I was so angry and upset and mad,” he says. Dennis McCollins Then a man that he met when he was sent to Job Corps as a teen turned...
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Program shows teachers how to see signs of childhood trauma [TheET.com]
When a child is acting out or not paying attention in school, it might not be because he or she is misbehaving. It might be because a parent was arrested the previous night. Teachers don't always know about the traumatic events a child experiences at home, but a new program being organized in Mercer County could give teachers notice when one of their students need to be handled with care. Andrea Darr, director of the West Virginia Center for Children's Justice spoke May 6 at Mercer County...
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Program to help young students expanding [WTOV9.com - Video and Article]
By Brittany Grego, WTOV 9 Fox, West Virginia August 22, 2016 OHIO COUNTY, W.Va. — School is back in session for Ohio County students and a program is expanding to more elementary schools. Crittenton Services is bringing the TIES program to five more elementary schools this year, including Elm Grove. TIES stands for trauma informed elementary schools. The TIES program is designed to help students in grades pre-K through first grade who show symptoms of chronic stress or trauma in the...
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Programs that teach emotional intelligence in schools have lasting impact [ScienceDaily.com]
"Social-emotional learning programs teach the skills that children need to succeed and thrive in life," said Eva Oberle, an assistant professor at UBC's Human Early Learning Partnership in the school of population and public health. "We know these programs have an immediate positive effect so this study wanted to assess whether the skills stuck with students over time, making social-emotional learning programs a worthwhile investment of time and financial resources in schools."...
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Promising Research on Mindfulness for Kids (eomega.org)
Mindfulness trains our brains to respond in ways we choose instead of always in a default manner, which often is a knee-jerk reaction from the reptilian part of the brain. This is especially pertinent in situations that bring up stress or conflict. For instance, if a child has learned to use violence to react to feeling scared, mindfulness can help him or her become aware of this habitual behavior and the feelings underneath it, and ultimately rewire the reaction to a constructive and...
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“Punitive Discipline Policies Have Proven to Be Destructive to Children” [truthout.org]
Janine Jackson: Nothing says America 2018 like a spate of stories on how back-to-school shopping includes bulletproof backpacks. Arming teachers and gearing kids up like commandos are presented as more-or-less reasonable responses to concerns about school safety. Any violence in schools is too much, of course, but a conversation about school safety that’s focused on guns and bullets is a narrow and distorted conversation. Recasting our definition of a “safe school environment” could lead us...