They really work!

At Henley, we’ve invested a lot of time over the past several years in developing and implementing
programs that are designed to focus on improving our kids’ social and emotional well being.
We’ve put in place things like second step, morning meetings, common sense media
studies and we’re hoping to have some good strategies about building growth mindsets
going in the next year. These programs take a lot of time for our staff, and I appreciate all of the hard work that each of them has put into implementing them with our students.

A study recently published by a group of researchers at Columbia University’s Teachers
College shows us that these programs really do have a great value to our students and to
society as a whole. This study focused specifically on the return on investment schools
and society see from implementing strong social-emotional programs. It found that for
every dollar a school system invests in these programs, there is an average return of eleven
dollars worth of benefits. Now, I’m no economist, and things get a little fuzzy for me
when they are explained in terms of dollars, so I’ll steal a quote from an edweek article to
help explain what this means.

“[A] successful bullying intervention may reduce missed school days that can cause
students to struggle and need extra academic supports, and it may reduce the amount of
costly personnel time that staff spend addressing student complaints. And programs that
lead to improved academic results may lead to higher income for students later in life, the
report says.”

The report specifically cited two programs we use or have used in Henley--Second Step
and Responsive Classroom (the ideas of which we are building our morning meeting
program around). This was really affirming to me that we are on the right course with the
programs we are putting in place, and that they will have long-term benefits for our kids.
If you’re interested in reading the article, you can find it here.