- Brophy Elementary
- Homepage
Friends of Resiliency for Life, Inc. Covers Cost for SEL Training
Tuesday, May 14, 2019
Thank you to Mark Goldschmidt, Resiliency for Life Program Coordinator and Teacher, for providing the information below.
Friends of Resiliency for Life, Inc. Covers Cost for SEL Training
The Resiliency for Life Program at Framingham High School is staffed by a teacher and social worker who help about 40 at-risk students in grades 9-12 to navigate their academic and social emotional challenges. About 11 years ago Friends of Resiliency for Life, Inc., a non-profit 501c3 charity was formed to support the program, including raising funds for items that the school system is unable to cover. This includes helping families pay for therapy appointments and transportation to the school for meetings, snacks for the students so they can focus better in class, one-time grocery or utility bill payments, incentive awards for good grades or attendance, and even college sweatshirts for seniors when they receive acceptance letters.
Program teacher and coordinator Mark Goldschmidt appealed to the board of the Friends of Resiliency for Life, Inc. organization to fund a training by Dr. Larry Epstein, a private clinician who created the Calm, Compassionate Teaching model for working with challenging students. Dr. Epstein trained another cohort of FPS teachers and administrators last spring thanks to a state earmark secured by Senator Karen Spilka. The philosophy behind the approach is, as Dr. Epstein advises, that “Students aren’t GIVING teachers a hard time. They are HAVING a hard time.” He encourages teachers to look for antecedents for behaviors, whether implosive or explosive, that are not conducive to learning. Generally these fall under one or a combination of skill deficit areas: Communication, Emotion Regulation, Sensory Processing/Regulation, Executive Function, Social Thinking or Cognitive Flexibility. Once educators can identify the areas of skill deficits they can use some of his methods either in the moment or proactively to prevent future adverse behaviors.
The training was broken up into two parts--a two-session initial training facilitated by Dr. Epstein and Kirk Downing, Assistant Superintendent of Schools in Natick. These occurred on Tuesday, March 5th and Tuesday, March 12th from 3:30-7:00 pm and 32 educators from across the district attended.
The second part of the training involves the participants being separated into smaller groups and doing video conference sessions with Dr. Epstein in late March and April. These four one-hour weekly conferences allow the participants to do case studies about actual challenging students they have so that they can go back and try different suggestions offered by Dr. Epstein and the rest of the group. Then, the following week they can debrief and discuss what worked and what didn’t so they can refine their approach. The group included administrators, elementary, middle and high school classroom teachers, out of school time program staff, school counselors and social workers and Special Education aides.
If more money is available next school year the hope is that Dr. Epstein and Mr. Downing can return to train a third cohort of educators. The reaction to the training has been incredibly positive. Many trainees offered that they began using the approach the day after the first training session with very fruitful results. Two teachers even asked how to go about ensuring that the staff at their entire school be trained. Another said that it is a great complement to the Restorative Justice method that her school has been using since it’s another very helpful tool in her toolbox of ways to work with struggling students.
For more information on the Calm, Compassionate Teaching approach please reach out to Mark Goldschmidt, Resiliency for Life Coordinator at mgoldschmidt@framingham.k12.ma.us or 508-782-7583 or go to www.calmcompassion.com.