The Data Is In: Transforming Teachers Transforms Teens
Our New Model is Working!
Since 2014, Peace in Schools has delivered our for-credit, research-backed Mindful Studies course to over 6,500 high schoolers. A question we’ve pondered for years is: How can we serve more teens? Not growth just for growth’s sake; rather, expansion because every teen deserves an education in love, awareness, and belonging.
In 2022, the Peace in Schools team dug deep and designed a new way to deliver our semester-long Mindful Studies course that could multiply our reach while keeping the depth and impact of the class. We bet that focusing on the transformation of the teachers would be key. Our guiding question became: How can we transfer our pedagogy and curriculum to embedded high school teachers without losing depth and impact?
In September 2023, Peace in Schools launched the 3-year Mindful Studies Partnership Program (MSPP) which certifies teachers to teach Mindful Studies. With an average of 13 years’ teaching experience, this cohort of 6 high schools included teachers from all disciplines - English, Math, Social Science, Health, English Language Arts - as well as a school counselor and mental health specialist. To set these educators up for success, the 3-year partnership requires leadership engagement, mindfulness professional development for staff, and teacher, student, and school data collection to monitor impact.
The course-end student surveys completed by students in January indicate that our bet paid off: transforming teachers transforms teens. Students taught by the newly certified teachers meet or surpass the high standards set by our Portland Public Schools (PPS) direct service program. Students are overwhelmingly satisfied with the course with 96% willing to recommend Mindful Studies to their peers.
This data indicates that our in-depth train-the-trainer model (the Mindful Studies Partnership Program represented in blue) is as effective as our proven direct service model (through which we have served over 6,000 Portland Public School students, represented in yellow). 140 out of 181 MSPP students completed the survey. Our Mindful Studies elective continues to serve high levels of students who experience systemic social barriers, including students of color (49%) and LGBTQ+ students (38%).
Ingredients for Success
We believe these aspects of the new Mindful Studies Partnership Program are key ingredients for success:
Effective teacher training & mentorship, that begins with a transformative experience for the educators themselves (to learn more about the intensive certification program, go here)
Leadership buy-in, meaning principals are engaged in our program and actively supporting Mindful Studies teacher(s) as they implement the course
Professional development to spread awareness of the benefits of mindfulness across the entire school community, facilitated by Peace in Schools mentors
Teacher integration, meaning these certified Mindful Studies teachers are already fully integrated staff, not outside providers coming in to teach the class
Key Themes from Student Voices
As we continue to invite new high school partners to join the Mindful Studies Partnership Program, what we hear from the teens will be our main measure of success. These are the main areas of improvement we see from qualitative student data:
CONNECTION AND BELONGING
“This class has been most useful to me for fostering the strengthening of my connection to my peers, which is MAJOR as someone who has felt disconnected and outcasted since Day 1 at this school.”
SELF-COMPASSION AND RESILIENCE
“When my soccer coach yelled at me the other day, it bothered me but I accepted his feedback and when I was alone I allowed myself to be upset and then was able to reassure myself that a mistake in a game doesn’t define me as a player or person.”
STESS REDUCTION AND SCHOOL PERFORMANCE
“I had a hard math test and was stressing about it... being negative towards myself and how smart I was... being very tense. But I slowed down, used deep belly breathing to calm me down so I could think properly, and then used noticing and labeling thoughts to process what was going through my mind and setting my focus on something else in the room.”
INTEGRATING MINDFULNESS INTO DAILY LIFE
“Whenever I get upset with my parents or friends instead of projecting my feelings onto them, I can use strategies like mindful walking and journaling to let go of my anxiety and stress.”
To learn more or bring Mindful Studies to your school visit: https://www.peaceinschools.org/mindful-studies-teacher-certification
We fundraise to reduce financial barriers for our high school partners, relying almost entirely on foundations and generous individual donors to deliver life-saving mindfulness tools to our teens. To support this work visit: https://www.peaceinschools.org/donate
