In the current moment, a focus on student voice can help support students’ sense of connection and belonging and can help mitigate the uncertainty and anxiety many may be experiencing. Often, adults in schools begin by trying to resolve issues by making decisions themselves, but in trauma-sensitive schools educators ask students about what they need and listen carefully to their responses before taking action.
In this post, we note how trauma-sensitive school leaders focus on creating learning environments that are safe havens, where students are met “where they are” and supported as such to re-connect, to develop needed skills, and to maintain their physical and emotional health and well-being.
Schools play a significant role in supporting not only a young person’s academic development but their healthy social-emotional development as well. Disruptions from the pandemic have undermined school’s supportive role, especially for those students at critical transitional stages.
Viewing the pandemic as a shared exposure to trauma among everyone in the school community helps us look differently at what is in front of us. It also helps us respond differently with a focus on practices that can mitigate the impact of the traumatic experience of the pandemic by strengthening the sense of community in our school.
TLPI shares a series of blog posts highlighting key take-aways that we have heard from discussions with trauma-sensitive school leaders as they reflect on how utilizing the trauma lens guides them in their response to the ongoing pandemic-related challenges.
We are thrilled to share with you a new website, www.students-speak.org, that provides a platform that uplifts students’ voices and showcases their actions and advocacy to help create schools that provide what they need in order to do well.
As schools reopen how can we use what we know about the impacts of trauma to provide learning environments in schools that will respond to the many emerging and varied needs of students? One way is to keep trauma-sensitivity at the forefront of planning as students return.
The January, 2021 edition of School Administrator, the American Association of School Administrators’ award-winning monthly magazine, features an article titled , Trauma Sensitivity in Early Learning, which describes the importance of safety, connection and the application of the trauma lens in early learning including the critical role of family engagement.
The Conference Committee maintained critical funding for Safe and Supportive Schools in their FY 21 budget, allocating $510,684.00 to the Safe and Supportive Schools line item (7061-9612). We are grateful to the lead sponsors Representative Ruth Balser and Senator Sal DiDomenico.
In this short video, “Building Trusting Relationships Between Teachers & Students,” listen to Eddie, Destiny, Lola, and Juliebeth, students at the Salem Academy Charter School, a trauma-sensitive demonstration school, speak passionately about the impact their trusted teachers have on their education and passion for learning.