New Haven Public School’s (NHPS) will focus attention on its students’, educators’, and parents’ wellbeing for a “day of healing.”
For a second year in a row, the district is hosting a “Day of Hope and Healing,” this Friday.
It will be focused on fostering students’, parents’, and educators’ social-emotional learning (SEL) skills during the particularly difficult recent years with the Covid-19 pandemic.
The Board of Education Monday night approved the superintendent’s plan to make the full day into a half- day session for all schools.
This year all city public schools will offer virtual interactive presentations and in-person activities promoting self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision making.
Click here to register for workshops.
Superintendent Iline Tracey at Tuesdays presser.
Superintendent of Schools Iline Tracey spoke about the plan at a Tuesday press conference held in one of Truman School’s “sensory hallways,” created three years ago. The hallway, decorated with student art and stickers pointing to activites on the ground, allows Truman students to take a break from classes when needed and “self-regulate self-manage when they need a break” and “wiggle their wiggles out,” Truman Principal Kathleen Mattern said.
Truman has also implemented an SEL check-in daily with its students.
On Friday, topics will range from mindfulness, yoga, and breathing techniques to neurotrophic art, social justice and advocacy, and music.
The day will also provide educators and students with the “autonomy to decide within their classrooms how the day is structured,” Social Emotional Learning Coordinator Monica Abbott said.
The plan is for classrooms to vote on the live presentations the group is most interested in. Classes can choose among live virtual SEL sessions, pre-recorded SEL video activities, and/or SEL-focused classroom activities.
More than 35 workshops will be offered and led by district educators, local organizations , and some students. The district will partner for presentations by the city’s youth and rec department, New Haven Symphony Orchestra, and Movimiento Cultural Afro-Continental Inc.
Movimiento Cultural will be performing live at Fair Haven school, streamed into all classrooms. Another presentation will be given by a former NHPS student that will discuss starting up a music business and Youtube channel.
“We are listening to you. We are concerned about what is happening in our schools. To say to our students we hear you,” Tracey said.
Each school is encouraged to curate the day of healing to what its school community needs, Abbott said. The half day will also allow families to enjoy the day “well after the bell rings” by having more time in the day to spend outside.
“Even the superintendent needs a day of hope and healing,” Tracey quipped.
The day was established last year as apart of the district’s mission to take care of the “whole student.”
“Children are not just coming to school to learn content. They’re much more than content,” Tracey said.
Watch the full press conference below.