January - 2021

Part I: The CASEL Guide to Schoolwide Social and Emotional Learning

Jan 29, 2021
4 min

Part I: The CASEL Guide to Schoolwide Social and Emotional Learning

By Kelsey Remeis, CEI Intern CASEL, the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning, released The CASEL Guide to Schoolwide Social and Emotional Learning in the summer of 2020. This guide provides a step by step process for cultivating a school community that uses SEL in every part of the students’ experience. The guide consists of four “focus areas,” each of which is complemented with a rubric so that users of the guide can keep up with and assess their progre

The Power of the Collective: Overcoming Adversities Together Through the Community Resiliency Model

Center for Educational Improvement

Jan 22, 2021
4 min

The Power of the Collective: Overcoming Adversities Together Through the Community Resiliency Model

By Melody Mann, CEI Intern The Community Resiliency Model (CRM) is an evidence based practice that focuses on training community members to help one another as a collective in their wider social networks. This skill-based stabilization program helps people understand how to realign the natural balance of their nervous system (Trauma Resource Institute, 2020). CRM calls upon people to come together, regardless of their age, background, or education level to create community. T

Building Community Resilience: Healthcare workers and Educators Addressing and Reducing Trauma

Center for Educational Improvement

Jan 22, 2021
6 min

Building Community Resilience: Healthcare workers and Educators Addressing and Reducing Trauma

By Taylor Bryan Turner, SAMHSA Region One Assistant Regional Administrator and Dana Asby, CEI Director of Innovation & Research Support The collective trauma we are enduring with the COVID-19 pandemic, persistent racial injustice, and violence in our nation’s capital and around the country, has led communities to come together to address youth and family mental health, demonstrating community resilience. SAMHSA (Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration) Regi

Advocating for Community Wellness: Empowering Student, Family, and Educator Voice

Center for Educational Improvement

Jan 22, 2021
4 min

Advocating for Community Wellness: Empowering Student, Family, and Educator Voice

By Dana Asby, CEI Director of Innovation & Research Support, and Ingrid Padgett, CEI Director of Communications and Development Who knows better what a school community needs to thrive than the students, families, and educators who serve them? Often, policies, procedures, and important decisions are crafted by administrators at the district, state, and federal level, without any input from students, families, teachers, mental health professionals, or community members who are

Featured Fellow: Providence’s District Coordinator for Project AWARE Amy Messenger

Center for Educational Improvement

Jan 22, 2021
4 min

Featured Fellow: Providence’s District Coordinator for Project AWARE Amy Messenger

By Jenna Wyman, CEI Intern Providence, Rhode Island School District’s Amy Messenger has always felt the drive to support others. Starting with volunteer work in high school and college, eventually working professionally as a social worker and in foster care, she is an individual who truly personifies the values of community wellness. Through these early career experiences, Messenger was a first-hand witness to the inequity of mental health resource distribution and the result

Center for Educational Improvement

Jan 11, 2021
5 min

Equity Consciousness

By Christine Mason, CEI Executive Director and Orinthia Harris, CEI Faculty Our HeartMind e-News connects the relationship of heart centered learning and mindfulness to current research and circumstances. Our goal is to provide our readers with concrete opportunities to further implementation of heart centered practices in their schools and districts. These opportunities will include suggestions for reflection, journaling, dialoguing, and compassionate classroom activities.

Center for Educational Improvement

Jan 7, 2021
3 min

Attack on the Sanctity of Our Democracy

A joint statement from MEMSPA (the Michigan Elementary and Middle School Principals Association) and the Center for Educational Improvement John Lewis wrote shortly before his death, “ Democracy is not a state. It is an act, and each generation must do its part to help build what we called the Beloved Community, a nation and world society at peace with itself.” Yesterday, we were stunned with a sense of an unbelievable horror and dread as we watched events play out in our na

Center for Educational Improvement

Jan 5, 2021
5 min

Music, a Tool to be More Mindful?

By Zenisha Shah, CEI Writer and Counselor at Innisfree House School Today’s schools and education look a lot different from what they were a decade ago. Digitalization of media has changed learning and socializing. Students are exposed to so much more information, knowledge, and media throughout the day. The way we learn, share information, and make friends is changing. In this world of smart gadgets and instant gratification, the distractions are innumerable. The same comput