Student Services Builds Resilience

Pisgah Elementary School Counselor Tara Mowrey fills Wellness Bags for her students during a virtual learning period in the 2020-2021 school year.

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Pictured: Pisgah Elementary School Counselor Tara Mowrey fills Wellness Bags for her students during a virtual learning period in the 2020-2021 school year.

By Tim Reaves
BCS Communications Department

Students, parents, and staff have all been affected by the stress and constant changes during COVID. In order to positively impact learning and emotional health, our community schools are teaching and supporting student resiliency. We're giving students the tools to build and maintain positive relationships through social skills development. By blending social skills into academic teaching and providing emotional support for students and staff, our schools provide a safe and secure place for everyone to learn and thrive.

For the last three years, BCS has been implementing a Multi-Tiered System of Supports (MTSS), which provides comprehensive academic, behavioral, and social-emotional supports for students and staff. Supports are layered, with a baseline for everyone and more intensive interventions available for those who need them most. Through these supports, schools are becoming rocks of stability in the turbulent waters of COVID-19 and the day-to-day challenges of growing up. They’re also preparing students to be career, college, and community ready.

“Social-emotional learning is problem-solving,” said BCS Student Services Department Director David Thompson. “It’s being aware of yourself and who you are, being aware of and understanding others, and being able to use what you learn to build community. It’s really very simple, but it requires focused attention and intentionality. This is something teachers have done since forever, but we’re making it more deliberate and complete. By integrating social-emotional learning in everyday instruction, we build stronger students.”

To that end, Student Services has hired three social-emotional learning coaches who will work closely with teachers and instructional coaches to help connect social-emotional learning to classroom instruction. The department is also adding four social workers, one school counselor, and four school-based mental health clinicians this year.

Social-emotional instruction builds on decades of best teaching practices to guide students to target levels of resilience and self-awareness – from perspective-taking to stress management to goal setting and relationship building. For example, students might be asked to imagine how a historical figure or a fictional character might have felt at a specific moment. That helps them imagine other perspectives and build empathy. Or a teacher might pair students to discuss a topic and have each student report on what the other one said about a subject. This teaches social awareness by connecting students to each other and exercising their listening skills.

“These strategies work no matter what you’re teaching,” said BCS District PBIS (Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports) Coordinator Michelle Smith. “It’s part of what we do all day every day. We help every student grow, and we give more help to those who need it.”

PBIS builds proactive systems and practices that encourage healthy behavior, while the Compassionate Schools model brings trauma-informed care into the classroom for general stress reduction and help for vulnerable students. Culturally responsive practices help teachers create authentic connections with students to build trust and respect. Student Services has strengthened and broadened training in these supports to include more staff members during the pandemic.

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This video explains the BCS Compassionate Schools Model in more detail.

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