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Raising Adult Awareness

In August, 2019, we launched a year-long poster campaign designed primarily to increase the social and emotional competencies (and happiness) of Departmental staff and secondarily, to raise awareness around the role of social and emotional learning in our Agency’s work. Most content focuses on encouraging discrete SEL skills that contribute to self-care and mindfulness.

Increasing internal capacity and raising awareness is imperative to our statewide success in implementing SEL. If we believe that SEL is beneficial for young people, and that to effectively teach social emotional competencies we must first be competent ourselves, then it is crucial that we practice those beliefs from the highest levels of leadership.

We know that social emotional learning for students is correlated with increased academic performance, improved attitudes and behaviors, including motivation to learn, commitment to school, engagement in the classroom, fewer negative behaviors, and reduced emotional stress. Increasing social emotional competencies within SED could lead to happier, healthier employees, greater motivation and productivity, and more mindful decision-making.

Posters are hung above the sinks in every restroom in the Education Building and Annex and changed every two weeks. The location is important. Stepping into the restroom presumes stepping away from work-selves and increases the likelihood the individual will view the poster content from a personal perspective rather than a professional one, with willingness to consider the message or try the techniques and tools the posters provide.

The posters are provided below in PDF format. Feel free to download, edit, and use them in your own locations. (Perhaps consider adding a local contact person for SEL in your school, district, agency, or organization.) New posters will be added as they're released.

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