Jennifer Gallagher: And how are the children?

The Masai tribe in Africa has a traditional greeting in Swahili, “Kasserian ingera,” which means, “And how are the children.” The traditional response is, “All the children are well.” What a wonderful way to measure the health of a society: by prioritizing the well-being of children and those most vulnerable. In education today, there has been an expansion of the school’s role in supporting the well-being of students, particularly in the area of mental health. In an increasingly anxious world, schools are no longer just teachers of reading, writing, and arithmetic; they are now are teaching the skills and habits of well-being, both physical and mental.

Although school-based intervention in the area of mental health has also increased over the past 10 years, I am referring specifically to the expansion of teaching prevention skills. In Long Beach, we begin teaching yoga in pre-K and mindfulness techniques in the early elementary grades. Over the past five years, we have implemented a robust elementary guidance program that offers lessons on topics such as positive peer relationships, conflict resolution, safe choices, empathy and perspective, stress management, and smart social media use.” We also prioritize play in our earliest grades; arguably, that is the very best method for young children to learn healthy communication/relationship skills and habits.

We regularly make the connection between physical and mental wellness in programs as varied as our health and physical education programs and our farm-to-table initiative, in where students act as advisers and “taste testers” for healthy food options for our cafeterias. In our middle and high schools, an advisory program delivers similar wellness lessons, with an emphasis on helping teens make smart choices, set goals for their future, and connect to support systems when needed. We engage in this work with parents as our partners, frequently offering parent workshops, speakers, and direct supports. It is truly a whole-community endeavor to ensure the well-being of our children.

Next year, Long Beach hopes to open a wellness center at our high school. Modeled after a very successful one in the Oceanside school district, the center will, we hope, become a hub of wellness programming district-wide. It will offer optional programs like wellness walks and classes on stress management and good nutrition. It will help connect students to our school-based mental health providers, as well as to outside providers for deeper or more regular support. It will also function as an “oasis,” where students can stop in to catch their breath, listen to calming music, pet a therapy dog. Our hope is that this new center will help in our quest to “make wellness cool,” and assist our students in developing healthy habits that will stay with them for life.

I’m sure many readers may think, “Schools didn’t teach these things when I was a child.” The world is a very different place today; the threats to our children’s mental health, particularly stemming from social media, are real.

It is also true that the careers and jobs for which we are preparing our children are very different from those of the past. Increasingly, employers are looking for candidates who excel in “soft skills,” like “resilience, effective teamwork, cognitive flexibility, and empathetic listening,” as Alyson Klein wrote last month in Education Week.

Developing these social and emotional skills is not only helping students’ overall well-being, but also preparing them to be successful adults. In Long Beach, our approach focuses on developing the well-being of the whole child: body, mind and spirit. We hope to always be able to say, “All the children of Long Beach are well.”

Jennifer Gallagher is superintendent of the Long Beach School District.