Page 63 - Wellness Program 2022

STUDENTS
Physical Education
& Physical Activity Environment &
Nutrition
Social & Emotional Climate EMPLOYEES Engagement Family Physical COORDINATING POLICY, PROCESS, AND PRACTICE Counseling, Social & FAMILIES
Community
Services
Involvement
Psychological
Services
HEALTHY SAFE
CHALLENGED SUPPORTED ENGAGED
Social &
Environment
Emotional
Employee IMPROVING LEARNING AND HEALTH Health Climate
Wellness Education
Health
Services
COMMUNITY
The School District of Palm Beach County’s Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) team supported
district-wide implementation of SEL practices that focused on strengthening relationships, climate,
and culture as well as teaching social and emotional skills. The team provided district-wide professional
development sessions on these practices and created resources to support schools with implementing
SEL Morning Meeting, SEL Welcoming Rituals, Community Circles, and SEL lessons for all students. As
this was the first full school year back in-person since COVID-19 pandemic, these SEL lessons helped
teachers establish a classroom environment where students felt safe, supported, and ready to learn.

The SEL team received an overwhelmingly positive response to the district-created resources for the 2021-
2022 school year. At the elementary level, we had on average 1,139 weekly classroom views for the explicit
instruction videos which directly impacted approximately 18,504 elementary students. In secondary schools,
we had 402 weekly classroom views which directly impacted approximately 9,542 secondary students.
In addition, the SEL team introduced a new SEL Initiative for all elementary schools: SEL School-wide
Book of the Quarter. The idea behind this initiative is that each quarter every student in the school
has the opportunity to read and engage with a common text that promotes an SEL Essential Idea
to foster and strengthen our school communities through this shared experience. We received
tons of positive feedback about this initiative so we are continuing it again next school year (FY23).

Also, the SEL team focused on creating a District-wide communication plan to share with the community on
why SEL is important and what it looks like in Palm Beach County. The team created an SEL Brochure that
was sent home with every student and they partnered with The Education Network (T.E.N. ) to create videos
with students and staff at various schools across the District highlighting an SEL Competency and why those
SEL skills are important in school and in life. Lastly, the SEL team created a SEL Spirit Week in March 2022 and
provided each school with a toolkit as a resource for schools to think of ways they can promote the daily SEL
focus throughout the week on their campus.
The successes from FY22 include:

• Created an SEL Guide for the District to have a common SEL language centered around a weekly theme.
• High attendance at Summer and Preschool SEL District-wide Professional Learning sessions.
• High attendance at Adult SEL Professional Development Sessions and Emotional Resilience Educator Cohort
Sessions offered throughout the school year.
• Created a monthly newsletter to keep administrators, teachers, and district staff informed about the SEL
themes for that month.
• SEL Curriculum Resources were used frequently.
• Student facing SEL Morning Meeting slides were created to facilitate SEL meetings and were available in
both English and Spanish to accommodate our Dual Language school sites.
• SEL Campaign (mentioned above).
• Family Engagement Train-the-Trainer series and resources allowed every Title I school the opportunity
to host an SEL Family Engagement night to bring awareness about SEL as well as support parents with
strategies at home.
• For every SEL unit, the team created an Elementary Family & Caregiver letter to be sent home to families
to communicate with them and provide optional activities that those families could participate in at
home.
• The SEL team implemented SEL stakeholder workgroups facilitated focus groups & staff surveys to
elevate staff and youth’s voice.

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