5 Sep 2018
Spotlight

Building Safe, Engaging, and Equitable Schools

Image of young students with arms around each other

There are no quick fixes or easy solutions to respond to the tragedies that have occurred in schools across the country—but there are evidence-based ways to change school environments so that students and teachers feel safer. Safe and supportive schools create positive climates where students have strong social and emotional skills, feel physically and emotionally secure, are connected to and supported by their teachers, and consistently remain challenged and engaged in learning.

Furthermore, research has shown that students and teachers perform better when their schools

  • focus on student self-discipline, not external punishment;
  • promote healthy behaviors instead of suppressing unhealthy ones;
  • prevent problematic behavior rather than focus on punishment;
  • build connections to students rather than removing students from the school community; and
  • coordinate services systematically, instead of adding them piecemeal.

Drawing on extensive expertise in both research and technical assistance, AIR offers a wide array of resources, listed below, including the School Climate Quick Guide and the Trauma-Sensitive Schools Toolkit.

Related Centers

Center

National Center on Safe Supportive Learning Environments (NCSSLE)

The U.S. Department of Education’s National Center on Safe and Supportive Learning Environments provides a range of resources and expertise on emotional and physical safety, bullying, cyberbullying, substance use prevention, crisis response, and building trauma-sensitive schools. AIR has developed several guides and training products to support stakeholders in building and promoting safe and supportive learning environments.
Center

National Resource Center for Mental Health Promotion and Youth Violence Prevention (TA Center for Violence Prevention)

Funded by SAMHSA, the National Resource Center offers a range of resources and information on selecting, developing, and implementing programs that prevent youth violence and promote school safety and positive mental health. The Center features the Safe Schools/Healthy Students Framework Implementation Toolkit, which offers a three-phased approach—planning, implementing, and sustaining—to help school and community teams create safer and healthier environments.

Related Projects

Project

Digging Deeper into Social and Emotional Learning (SEL): Exploring the SEL Landscape

Social and emotional skills and competencies are essential for young people to succeed in school, work, and life. In the past decade, there has been an increasing number of studies, systematic reviews, meta-analyses, and syntheses that focus on the key role that social and emotional learning (SEL) plays in the success and well-being of children and youth. AIR, supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, designed and executed two related activities to explore and describe SEL for practitioners and researchers.

Related Work

26 Nov 2018
Book

Creating Safe, Equitable, Engaging Schools: A Comprehensive, Evidence-Based Approach to Supporting Students

Safe and supportive school communities foster students’ social, emotional, and academic needs. Educators want actionable strategies and practices to ensure that all students can access equitable learning environments. Creating Safe, Equitable, Engaging Schools helps school leaders make sense of the various evidence-based resources and frameworks designed to support the whole child.
Topic: 
Education, School Climate and Safety, Social and Emotional Learning
6 Oct 2016
Brief

Creating Healthy Schools: Ten Key Ideas for the SEL and School Climate Community

Healthy schools and supportive school environments provide connection, support, engagement, and physical and emotional safety, as well as access to social networks and resources for students. This brief, which evolved from a larger project funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, outlines the central principles needed to support students in an equitable, collaborative, and healthy environment.
Topic: 
Education, School Climate and Safety, Social and Emotional Learning
7 Mar 2016
Guide

Quick Guide on Making School Climate Improvements

This Quick Guide provides district and school leaders, teachers, school staff, and other members of the school community with information about how to initiate, implement, and sustain school climate improvements. This guide will help you plan; engage stakeholders; collect, analyze, and report school climate data; identify and implement interventions; and monitor and evaluate your progress.
Topic: 
Education, School Climate and Safety, Social and Emotional Learning
30 May 2018
Toolkit

Trauma-Sensitive Schools Toolkit

Commissioned by the White House Task Force to Protect Students from Sexual Assault, AIR developed a collection of guides and online training for college campus health staff caring for students who have experienced sexual assault and other trauma.
Topic: 
Education, School Climate and Safety, Social and Emotional Learning, Trauma-Informed Care
30 Mar 2018
Report

Best Practices, Strategies, and Recommendations for Improving School Climate and Culture

As states move forward with implementation of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), the topic of school climate is becoming increasingly important. This report by the Southeast Comprehensive Center at AIR summarizes 15 resources, which describe evidence-based approaches and interventions that may help to improve school climate and culture.
Topic: 
Education, Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), School Climate and Safety, Social and Emotional Learning
2 Mar 2018
Spotlight

Social and Emotional Learning: Creating Supportive Learning Environments for All

Recent research has demonstrated that when schools and districts focus on social and emotional learning (SEL), students’ academic achievement, prosocial behaviors, and positive attitudes improve, while their behavior problems and emotional distress decrease. Explore these selected resources, tools, and reports to discover our research and technical assistance on SEL practices.
Topic: 
Education, School Climate and Safety, School Discipline, Social and Emotional Learning, Teacher Preparation and Performance
31 Jan 2018
Brief

School Climate and Social and Emotional Learning: The Integration of Two Approaches

School climate and social and emotional learning (SEL) have often been treated separately by researchers and practitioners, but both are necessary to build healthy schools. This brief reviews research on how positive school climates support SEL and how improved SEL contributes to improved school climate in elementary and secondary schools.
Topic: 
Social and Emotional Learning, Education, School Climate and Safety
30 Aug 2017
Toolkit

Social and Emotional Learning Coaching Toolkit

Teachers recognize the importance of student social and emotional skill development; however, they often feel as though they do not have the time to support social and emotional learning (SEL). The purpose of this toolkit is to support coaches and administrators as they observe practices that support the development of social and emotional skills in classrooms, and hold critical conversations that include SEL.
Topic: 
Education, Social and Emotional Learning, Teacher Preparation and Performance
18 Feb 2017
Report

The Intersection of School Climate and Social and Emotional Development

Two related strands of research—social and emotional learning and school climate—provide guidance on how to support students in an equitable, collaborative, and healthy environment. This paper shares propositions from a project with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation about how to create healthy, safe, nurturing, and developmentally supportive schools.
Topic: 
Education, School Climate and Safety, Social and Emotional Learning
27 Apr 2017
Video

Long Story Short: What Can Districts and Schools Do to Improve School Climate?

School climate reflects how members of a school community experience their environment. Greta Colombi discusses how to identify and measure the many factors that affect conditions for learning and her work to improve school climate through the National Center on Safe Supportive Learning Environments.
Topic: 
Education, School Climate and Safety, Social and Emotional Learning
24 Oct 2016
Video

Social and Emotional Learning Explained: How SEL Helps Students in College, Career, and Life

Social and emotional learning (SEL) develops people’s ability to make successful life choices, to achieve academically, and to be college and career ready. In this video, Nick Yoder explains how SEL can help students and what research says about its effectiveness.
Topic: 
Education, Postsecondary Education, Social and Emotional Learning

Further Reading