To support the idea of creating a culture of wellness, Kaiser Permanente partner School-Based Health Alliance fashioned an innovative resource to guide health advocates as they create, implement and sustain schoolwide wellness efforts.

Social and emotional professional development sessions: We’ve all experienced feeling tired, burnt out, or insecure about our efficacy. I know this from my experience to be especially true in schools serving at-risk populations.

In one of those schools, our leadership addressed these feelings directly through professional development sessions called Fill Your Cup, which incorporated social and emotional learning. We had staff members sign up to lead activities they enjoyed, such as yoga, cooking, running, biking, singing karaoke... really anything that brought them joy.

Then each staff member signed up for two of the sessions to “fill their cups.” These sessions were always highly rated by our staff, and the next day the school always seemed to have a lightness in the air. The sessions provided a chance for staff to get to know each other in new ways, to blow off steam, to build stronger connections with each other, and to break down barriers of mistrust.