Gratitude for 2024-2025
We are incredibly grateful for the opportunity to partner with each district and school during the 2024-2025 school year. Many of you faced significant challenges, including devastation, loss, and heartache, yet you showed up every day. Together, we learned and implemented trauma-informed principles and resilience-based strategies. YOU are making a difference in North Carolina students and families. We trust that you all will have a restful summer! We loved celebrating the End of the Year with so many of you!
Love, the Resilience & Learning team
| | | |
School of the Month:
W.D. Williams Elementary School
| |
Rising After the Storm:
A Mountain School's Resilience
by Leslie Blaich
| | |
W.D. Williams Elementary is located in the picturesque Swannanoa Valley of Buncombe County, Western North Carolina. In late September 2024, the people of this community experienced the unimaginable - a devastating hurricane in the mountains. Over the past school year, I had the privilege of partnering with the teachers and staff of W.D. Williams as a project manager and coach with the NC Center for Resilience and Learning. In this issue, we honor this remarkable community and highlight how they weathered the storm, both literally and figuratively. In the months that followed, they not only endured but flourished, coming together to create an environment where students felt safe, welcomed, and supported. Their collective efforts fostered a space for healing, connection, and care for all.
The partnership between the NC Center for Resilience and Learning and W.D. Williams began in June 2024, almost exactly one year ago, and was initiated by Principal Christy Jones and Assistant Principal Kristen Frisbee. Their enthusiasm, dedication, and commitment to the work of implementing trauma-informed and resilience-focused practices have never wavered. As part of their intentional focus on adult wellness, this dynamic duo was excited to reveal the newly established Serenity Room to the staff during a work day at the beginning of the year. This quiet, comfortable space was kept stocked with snacks and calming amenities throughout the year.
| | |
Additionally, collective care practices and activities were incorporated into monthly staff meetings, continuously setting the tone for the positive culture Jones and Frisbee are leading within the school.
During April’s meeting, just before Spring Break, Principal Jones led a collective conversation around the prompt, "What are you most proud of in your response after Helene?" Teachers and staff had the opportunity to process the heavy experiences, thoughts, and emotions of the past six and a half months with their colleagues.
A 4th-grade teacher shared a profound reflection: she keeps a Post-it note on her classroom whiteboard where she marked each of her students as safe after making contact in the days following the storm. This serves as a reminder of all that her students and their families have been through and continue to experience.
A 3rd grade teacher described that although the loss of time in school felt reminiscent of COVID times, enduring a hurricane actually required the community to come together rather than be isolated from one another, which she felt was a gift.
After several rounds of sharing, Mrs. Jones clearly and sincerely stated that she hoped this conversation would allow everyone to truly rest and enjoy themselves as much as possible during the break—a true example of compassionate leadership and collective care within a school community.
| | |
In addition to participating in monthly staff meetings, I also had the opportunity to collaborate with the Core Culture team. This team has a representative from each grade level and department. They work hard to ensure the school’s PBIS processes and safety goals are being met.
We also began an asset mapping process to assess the school’s current practices in the four resilience-building areas:
- Adult Wellness;
- Warm, Responsive Relationships;
- Safe, Structured Environments; and
- SEL and Regulation Skills.
Through this process, the team was able to discover what I had been noticing all year as a guest with a more observational role: W.D. Williams was prepared to rise after the storm because they already had so many proactive practices in place. It was clear that the school could focus on the current circumstances, delve deeper into school-wide implementation, and celebrate both small and large successes.
Here are a few examples of practices that were already in place:
- Morning Meetings
- Check-in/Check-out system for students,
- Tap-in/Tap-out system for adults,
- Consistent classroom lessons with the School Counselor, Kelli Pritchard, who is known as the heart of the school, and numerous other ingrained strategies that nurture resilience (see document below).
| | |
It is also important to recognize that the school received significant support in the form of donations and various acts of kindness from local, state, and national groups and organizations.
Students were showered with cards and gifts, adults were fed during the school days, and families received resources. What W.D. Williams did so beautifully was share all the love they were receiving with each other, with students and their families, and then extend it back out into the surrounding community. For example, the school has established a partnership with the local non-profit Beloved Asheville to serve as a hub for food and resource distribution.
| | When I reflect on all my visits to the school over the year, I remember the smiles, the laughter, the conversations, the connections, and the overwhelming feeling that everything would be all right. There wasn’t much that was easy about this school year, but with an extreme amount of intention, care, and collective effort, the W.D. Williams community rose far above the rubble Helene left behind. I’m grateful to have witnessed and been part of this incredibly special school’s journey this year, and I’m inspired and excited to continue our partnership next year. #WDistheplacetoBE! | |
| |
Processing the Year Together: Creating Safe Spaces for Students to Reflect
Even now, years after leaving the classroom, I can close my eyes and see those empty desks that just hours before held my students—each one a universe of potential, challenges, and growth.
READ MORE
| | | |
| |
The Sacred Art of Holding Hope: When School Bells Fall Silent, but Hearts Keep Beating
And just like that, your heart does that thing it does—that beautiful, terrible expansion that reminds you why you chose this magnificent, impossible work of helping wounded souls remember they were born to soar.
But here’s the plot twist nobody warns you about: tomorrow...
READ MORE
| | | |
| |
Duke's Center for Child & Family Policy's 25th Anniversary: featuring Whitney McCoy
Dr. Whitney McCoy is one of our research partners at Duke. Read about her work with the CCFP.
READ MORE
| | | |
| |
North Carolina ranks 34th in the nation on youth wellbeing across education, health, economic indicators
“This data gives us a good idea of where we need to make meaningful, smart investments that strengthen families across our state and make North Carolina first in children,” said Erica Palmer Smith, executive director of the advocacy and research group NC Child, the state’s member of the foundation’s KIDS COUNT Network, in a press release.
READ MORE
| | | | Resources & Opportunities | |
NC Center for Resilience & Learning Releases Toolkit for Educator Preparation Programs
The North Carolina Center for Resilience & Learning is proud to announce the release of the Education Preparation Programs Trauma-Informed Practices Toolkit, designed specifically for educator preparation programs across North Carolina.
The toolkits include tailored resources for teacher, school counselor, and school administrator preparation programs designed to help institutions embed trauma-informed practices into training and professional development with future educators.
| | |
Certified Trauma & Resilience Trainer Summer Training Dates
Certifications empower educators, administrators, early childhood specialists, social workers, clinicians, and anyone who works directly with children to expand their expertise in trauma-informed practices.
Find Out More!
| | | The North Carolina Center for Afterschool Programs (NC CAP) is excited to invite you and Out-of-School Time professionals from all across our state to Synergy 2025!! | |
This year’s conference theme is Igniting Bright Futures! This theme highlights the incredible impact that afterschool professionals and programs have on children, youth, families, and communities. Afterschool and out-of-school time (OST) programs serve as vital spaces where young people feel safe, supported, and inspired to grow. Through meaningful relationships and enriching experiences, after-school providers ignite curiosity, foster resilience, and empower students to reach their full potential.
When: November 18-19, 2025
Where: McKimmon Conference and Training Center, Raleigh, NC
| | | Summer Workshop with Appointed to Lead! | | | |
2025 Building Resilience and Promoting Well-Being Plan for North Carolina's Children and Families
With 4 out of 10 children in North Carolina experiencing at least one adverse childhood experience (ACE), urgent action is needed to protect the well-being of children and families. This report from North Carolina's Essentials for Childhood Update Committee responds to this challenge by identifying strategic actions needed to prevent child maltreatment and other ACEs.
Download Here
| | |
Early Bird Registration for the 2025 SEL Exchange
Join a powerful community of educators, researchers, and leaders in Minneapolis, November 4-6, to turn bold ideas into actionable strategies that help young people thrive.
| | | Want your school to begin the journey to becoming trauma-informed? | | |
Elizabeth DeKonty
Director
NC Center for Resilience & Learning
(Raleigh, NC)
|
| |
Eulanda Thorne
Program Manager
NC Center for Resilience & Learning
(Wilson, NC)
| | |
Brian Randall
Western Senior Program Manager
NC Center for Resilience & Learning
(Asheville, NC)
| | |
Michelle Harris Jefferson
Sr. Program Manager of Professional Learning
NC Center for Resilience & Learning
(Greensboro, NC)
| | |
Orlando Dobbin, Jr
Eastern Senior Program Manager
NC Center for Resilience & Learning
(Greenville, NC)
| | |
Stacey Craig
Program Manager
NC Center for Resilience & Learning
(Raleigh, NC)
| | |
Leslie Blaich
Program Manager
NC Center for Resilience & Learning
(Marshall , NC)
| | |
Rebecca Stern
Consultant
NC Center for Resilience & Learning
(Carrboro, NC)
| | |
Ervin Jones
Consultant
NC Center for Resilience & Learning
(Elizabeth City, NC)
| | |
Katie Rosanbalm
Research & Evaluation Partner
NC Center for Resilience & Learning
(Duke University)
| | |
Whitney N. McCoy, Ph.D
Research & Evaluation Partner
(Duke University)
| | |
Jessica Edwards
Program Coordinator
NC Center for Resilience & Learning
(Nashville, NC)
| | |
Angela Mendell
Program Manager
NC Center for Resilience & Learning
(Elizabethtown, NC)
| | | | Our Partners and Sponsors | | |
The Resilience Reader is published monthly by the Public School Forum of NC and distributed to Forum members, educators, policymakers, donors, media, and subscribers -- or anyone interested in issues such as Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), childhood trauma, resilience and the power of trauma-informed schools and communities.
Please pass the word! Forward The Resilience Reader to anyone who may find this information useful.
If you received this email from a friend, subscribe to this newsletter by clicking here.
Archived editions will be located at https://resilienceandlearning.org/newsletter/.
©2024 Public School Forum of North Carolina. All Rights Reserved.
Public School Forum of North Carolina
919-781-6833
Follow us at @theNCForum
www.ncforum.org
| |
|
|
Subscribe to this Newsletter | | | | NC Center for Resilience & Learning | www.resilienceandlearning.org | |
| | | |
