Group Designs Program to Help States Educate the Whole Child Under ESSA Education World

Group Designs Program to Help States Educate the Whole Child Under ESSA

The Brzycki Group and the Center for the Self in Schools have announced a new series designed to help all 50 states promote student well-being by "educating the whole child" as according to new requirements under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA).

The overhaul of No Child Left Behind via ESSA allows states to potentially measure students on noncognitive traits and social-emotional skills; for the first time, the country’s education legislation requires state leaders to define student success using at least one nonacademic factor of their choice.

Defining student success through factors other than academic ones are what advocates refer to as "educating the whole child."

"At the core of the 'whole child' concept is the understanding that children grow physically, emotionally, and intellectually; therefore, school should attend to all of these areas of growth," says the Center for Inspired Teaching.

According to the Brzycki Group, they have helped to influence these new "whole child" ESSA requirements and are now determined to help states best adhere to them.

The Brzycki Group is led by Dr. Henry G. Brzycki, a thought leader in the fields of education and psychology who has been providing his expertise for over 30 years.

The Center for the Self in the Schools is his latest project that focuses specifically on impacting the "psychological, socioemotional, and physical well-being of K–16 students through outreach programs, professional development, self-knowledge curricula, antibullying programs, and high-impact student advising assessments using strengths-based counseling methods."

Combined, the two groups are introducing this week the Well-Being in School Workshop Series, a series designed to appropriately develop policies as defined under ESSA to ensure positive youth development in every school.

"The Series addresses: meeting the new ESSA requirements with whole child well-being programs; measuring what parents really want measured—the inner psychological attributions that will give children the tools for a happy, healthy and successful life; and integrating three research-based best practices into the curriculum," said The Brzycki Group in a statement.

The series integrates programs developed and provided by the Center for the Self in the Schools, specifically programs such as Integrated Self Model (iSelf), Self Across the Curriculum (SAC) and Success Predictor.