California Safe and Supportive Schools

Calming Spaces in Schools and Classrooms

Behavioral Support Strategies

Engaging the School Community in the Transformation Process

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The perspectives of diverse school community members are integral to school climate improvement efforts and ensure that a shared vision for safe and supportive learning environments is authentic and effective. In this audiocast, you’ll hear how San Diego Unified’s Horace Mann Middle School has engaged in team-based climate and connectedness improvement work to promote supportive student-staff relationships.

View the transcript for this audiocast.

Download the Horace Mann brief.

Overview of Promoting Student Resilience (PSR) Grant Program

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In 2016, the U.S. Department of Education awarded $4.75 million in Promoting Student Resilience (PSR) grants to three local educational agencies (LEAs): Baltimore City Schools; Chicago Public Schools; and St. Louis Public Schools. The communities in these three LEAs had experienced recent significant civil unrest (i.e., demonstrations of mass protest that involved law enforcement).

The funds supported LEAs’ efforts to build capacity to address the comprehensive behavioral and mental health needs of their students by supporting systems-wide approaches that link schools, mental health service providers, and community-based organizations.

This resource provides a brief overview of the grantees, their activities, support provided, and lessons learned.

Management Factors for Successful Program Implementation

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The team tasked with evaluating the California Safe and Supportive Schools (S3) Grant created this brief document to outline what is known from research about management factors that contribute to a program’s success. Activities and mindsets that contribute to successful program implementation are organized into 4 key areas:

  • Day-to-day project management
  • Administrative-level support
  • Training
  • At-risk student referral systems

While this document was intended to guide implementation of school climate improvement programs, the key tenants can be applied to other school-based program implementation scenarios.

Mindfulness-Based Practices for Schools

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Mindfulness practices cultivate attention to one’s thoughts, feelings, sensations, and how they affect one’s actions. Mindfulness is a promising approach to teaching educators and students self-awareness and self-regulation skills associated with success in school and through adulthood. It can be taught as standalone strategies for teachers’ own benefit and/or for use with students, and can be integrated into existing school structures and routines.

Research has linked mindfulness-based practices with outcomes indicative of a positive school climate and academic improvement, including:

  • Cultivation of compassion and empathy
  • Increased well-being, positive emotion, popularity, and friendship
  • Improved self-regulation
  • Reduced test anxiety
  • Increased student focus and concentration on cognitive tasks in the classroom
  • Improvement in reading competence

This brief describes the benefits of mindfulness for teachers and students, and shares ideas for integrating mindfulness throughout the school day, identifying evidence-based mindfulness programs to match strengths and needs, helping educators implement mindfulness programs and practices, and providing intensive supports for students facing additional challenges.