Whitepaper: A Systems Approach to Schools and Stress
Abstract:
The field of education has been in "crisis" for nearly 70 years. Billions have been spent, yet problems have compounded, with each district struggling to apply its own approach. One issue, safety for teachers and students, has become a focal point of the present generation. Teachers beg for intervention strategies and professional development for dealing with disruptive and violent behaviors. The lack of a systemic approach to solving these issues has resulted in disjointed attempts at support directed at what are behavioral symptoms of troubled systems. Feeling unsafe, unsupported, and overworked, with few personal strategies from which to draw, teachers are reporting greater levels of stress than ever before. Stress in the classroom is contagious and has been linked to worsening health issues, poorer performance, and eventually burnout for both students and teachers. Additionally, for teachers, as stress increases, burnout increases, and they then leave the educational field. Not only are teachers leaving in record numbers, fewer college students are choosing education as a career path. As such, the United States now finds itself in a teacher shortage that will only continue if the burnout rate remains as it is currently. To address this problem, school districts must be transformed in systematic, measurable, and sustainable ways to support teachers and provide them with the critical skills they need. Consultation in schools must provide teachers with a clear vision of what best practices look like and how to apply them in their specific classrooms. The author of this paper presents a consultation model that translates systems and neuroscience theories into practices that will impact schools in measurable and effective ways and that can be applied in the present case to reducing teacher stress and burnout.